MineCraft Online
by Mew Ike
Summary: You've seen SAO, you've played Minecraft. Now put them together. You got the idea. There is only one way out: defeat the the three elder dragons, that's right ELDER dragons. Masters of the End, the Nether, and the Overworld. 6 friends embark on a journey to save millions of players from death, many of which who are falling to the dark hand that is Herobrine. Rated T for language.
1. Six Unusual Friends: Pre-Game!

It's the day everyone has been waiting for: The release of MCO: MineCraft Online. When Microsoft bought Mojang, original creators of the pixel-savvy game, they stunned the world when they said that they had come out with something spectacular. They had created a helmet that could create a virtual reality around you, much like the Oculus Rift, which was basically a screen that you wrapped to your head.

Yet this one was better. The helmet, known as the Omniscient, connects several wires to your head and maps your brain. This is similar to the technology that is used to tell if people are experiencing seizures, dreaming, or just to see if their brain is functioning at all. This helmet can project the images right into your brain, behind your eyes, and activate parts of it that move your arms and legs so you can move freely in the game.

To keep it simple, Microsoft decided to try their invention with a game that needed little to no high-res graphics: Minecraft. This game was somewhat different than the one you know. They made it a single world realm that all players can talk and walk about. They added CPU's and more mobs to make the game more like the traditional MMORPG. The world has no limits, it can be expanded and created indefinitely even with the large amount of people in it. And the best part: the game and Omniscient were cheaper than expected. Over 35 million players were registered on the first day it came out.

I was one of them.

My name is Maria. I never liked my real name, so I always went by the username Marshmallow Unicorn. When I first received the Omniscient, I thought it would be too big for my tiny head. When I placed it on my head at home, hoever, it tightened around my cranium like an adjustable robotic glove. It fit snugly, but my long red hair had to be yanked out uncomfortably from the back. When I pulled the goggles over my face, the freckles on my cheeks began to glow from the light blue light that the inside of the gaming gear emitted. It warmed my face dully.

I reached over and texted my friend via a group chat.

"I'm getting on," I typed.

"Me, too."

"Same."

"Getting ready."

"Give me a few minutes."

"Already on it."

They were all accounted for. "Meet at the usual coordinates," I reminded. Every game we ever entered, we gathered at the same set location so we didn't ever lose each other. We would wait at max a MineCraft week for everyone to gather. While waiting, we would gather the resources we needed and move out into one of the more abandoned biomes: Desert, ice spike, ocean, and try to make a living there. We were profession MineCraft gamers. We even had a stream going on every few days. We only topped about five hundred views each, but it was a start. When MCO took off and expanded, we might be able to stream from it as well.

I closed my eyes and almost right away the Omniscient posted a picture of the countdown to the start of MCO. Ten minutes. My friends were excitedly texting each other about how awesome it would be, how much better Microsoft had made it, and the like. I just hoped it wasn't laggy and it didn't start out with a crash when all the players signed on. Granted, since the year 2020, they have gotten their stuff together for the sake of making better games.

I just hoped they didn't muck this up like they did with the ancient Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

Five minutes till it started. The pre-game was starting, allowing us to customize our characters. My five friends were in chat with me as I made the pixelated character to my liking.

"I think we should all have matching skins," my friend Ham said. He was the crazy one of the group. He even named himself, pardon my French, Hard Ass MoFo. He was impulsive, wild, loud, and somewhat insane. He took the biggest risks for the smallest prizes in MineCraft. Yet, somehow, he had died the least amount of times out of all of us. He was crazy good with a sword and even better with enchantments. He was the brawler of the group.

"Matching skins sound good," I agreed, erasing my current work. "What should we go as?"

"Assassins. Or Demons." Scarlet was the gothic princess of her time. She loved to collect trolls, dragons, and anything demonic. She focuses a lot of her conversations on death, but more often than that she has a dry sense of humor that we all know and love. She was the assassin of the group. She could take any enemy by surprise with the bow and arrow she always had to make by herself. Her username: Sacred Goddess. "Maybe we should be the minions of Herobrine. That'd be pretty cool."

"How about something geeky," York put in. You could hear him adjusting his glasses under the helmet. "I hope they have a way for visually impaired people. If not, I'll be walking through mist the entire game." York, also know as Yoshi Tamer. He was the brains of the group. He spent his time with redstone machines, getting us ready for big invasions to the Nether or the End. He was usually on the sidelines throwing us the potions we needed. He was your typical math club attending, video game loving, computer nerd. He wasn't a fighter. Couldn't keep up with us for the life of him. We had to protect him whenever it came to fighting. We usually gave him the best armor and the best enchantments in case things got sticky. "I think we should pick a character from Super Smash Bros."

"I like it," Annabelle said. "But I get to be Zelda. Called it right from the start." Anabelle was a nerd just like York, but loved anime instead of math and other things. Her username was Anime Eyes. Knowing her, she'd take a Zelda skin and make the eyes on it just to her liking. You can guess the rest. She was a builder. She made everything from dirt houses to skyscrapers. She can farm and breed animals and know precisely how long it would take to get the exact amount she wanted. She loved gathering materials above the surface. In her meantime she was either watching anime, reading manga, cosplaying, or fangirling over a virtual boyfriend she had made in GaiaOnline.

"I'll take Ike," Ruben said. "He's overpowered. I can take on anything with that." Ruben: also known as the Righteous God. He was the miner, adventurer, and gatherer of the group. He was usually the first one to find the End portal, the first to make it to the Nether, and the supplier of the majority of our underground goods. In real life, he was the cool kid. The one who smokes only when it was time to break out the leather jacket and studded boots. He even rode a motorcycle. It was up to us to make sure that no one else knew he played MineCraft, especially MCO.

"I'll take Samus," Scarlet called in her dark, emotionless voice.

"I got Yoshi," York called predictably.

"King Dedede FTW!" Ham called.

"And I'll take Pikachu." You must be wondering what I do. I'm the leader of the group. I'm good at Minecraft all around. My favorite aspect was using dynamite. If there was something in the way, I'd be there to blow that shit into another dimension. I was ready to lead these five onto victory.

Right when we keyed in our skins, our Omniscients started humming. All six of us leaned back in our beds, closed our eyes, and watched the starting menu open. After a while of scrambling to figure out how to work this thing, we managed to open up the game on the only server appropriately named MCO WORLD. We clicked it and almost instantly the world loaded. I was about ready to type in the coordinates, but every single one of my friends spawned next to me. They must've detected us being in the same part and put us together. It was a nice feature. We spawned in the middle of a swamp. Across our field of vision, colorful words started appearing across our screen.

Welcome To MCO

Microsoft Welcomes You, Marshmallow Unicorn!

There Will Be No Cheating, No Creative Mode, Or Mods Allowed.

PVP Is Allowed In Certain Areas, Such As The Wild.

Cities Can Be Displayed On Your Map, Provided In Your Inventory.

When You Die, You Will Be Respawned Where You Stand Now, Or From A Bed.

Game Mode Is Set To Medium.

Enjoy MCO!

The screen cleared and my friends came into view in their custom skins. Annabelle blinked in her Zelda skin then looked down at herself. She did a quick twirl before shaking her fists near her face, squealing in delight.

"The dress moves with me!" Her voice was high pitched. "Talk about high res!" Ruben had already opened up his map and was scanning it in his overly large hands. The skin we wore could even make out our facial expressions, because I could look of discontent in his face.

"It doesn't say where the mines are," he mumbled. "Damn, thought I could get a head start. But I guess our spawnpoint is pretty desolate. We won't be competing with anyone."

"They even allow you to pull up the coordinates and light levels," York announced. "Our ping looks good, frames per second marvelous, and our connection is strong. There is no crashes or lag in the foreseeable future, ladies and gents."

"Good," Scarlet had the zero-suit samus skin on. She toyed with her hair as she studied the landscape. "The sunrise is pretty. The pixels make it look nice." Then she looked around. "Ham...?" He was currently in front of the nearest tree, using unnecessary combat skills to punch, kick, and whittle away at the bark.

"Evereh buddeh was kung fu fightin'!" he shouted. "Hyuh!" The first block of wood came out and he picked it up in its' petite form. He held it to the sky and then placed it back down, where he stood on top, announcing, "I claim this world as mine!"

"Huddle up, folks." The five of them stopped what they were doing and approached at my call. "First thing's first. We have to get to one of these cities they were talking about. On the way there, we'll get the trees, the food, the materials we need. Yosh, get us to the nearest city."

"About a thousand and three hundred blocks north," he reported. "There are players displayed on this map, each arrow representing us, each star representing a group of a million people. We are lucky. We spawned closer than most groups. Some are hundreds of thousands blocks away. They'll have to aim for another city."

"Good, the less there, the easier." I turned to the rest of the group. "Are you guys ready?" They nodded in unison, holding up a fist in anticipation. "Alright. Let's get going."

Welcome To MCO!

Character Analysis: Maria.

Username: Marshmallow Unicorn.

Special Skill: Explosive Expert.

Skin: Pikachu.

In Party With Five Others.

Autosaving…

Saved!

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	2. Bow To The Legion Or Die!

Chapter 2

"I'm tellin' ya, Marshy," Annabelle said, twirling after every chop of wood with her stone axe. Ruben had already gathered the cobblestone and made us each our own stone swords, sword axes, stone pickaxes, and stone shovels. We each had enough to last us a while, but leather armor was harder to come by. Half the team had a full set, but Ham and Scarlet were working overtime to find cows to get the leather. We didn't have any saddles, so even the horses we came across we had to kill to get the leather needed.

By the time the city came into the distance, we spread out to find some more. Like always, York went with Scarlet, Annabelle went with Ruben, and I went with York. We were never to separate from our partners unless completely necessary. York and I made a great duo. He was harmless and defenseless, so I was able to calm him down and keep him from being harmed. Ham and Scarlet were the brains and the brawn like us. Annabelle and Ruben were probably the most experienced pair.

"Over there," York instructed. I looked where he nodded. There was a herd of cattle roaming about on their thick legs, mooing the same moo repeatedly. I jumped over to them and slayed every one of the cows, gathering seven pieces of leather total. It wasn't a lot, but it could get the rest of us just under what we needed. "We're being teleported." I turned to York.

"What?" I asked. He had his coordinates open. "Someone is typing our names, not just you and I, but the whole group. It's composed of a long list of names. Oh… Oh my. It's the entire list of players the system is hoping to teleport." He adjusted the glasses he had put on his yoshi character. "That's unusual. The system that is teleporting everyone is typing it one by one. They must've been doing this from the start. It's like a microsoft employee is doing it by hand." He paused.

Oh no. Whenever York pauses, it could mean two things: he was either calculating some impossibly large numbers in his head, or something had gone terribly wrong. I lowered my sword and stared at him. The anxiety was already kicking in. I know he didn't have his usual piece of paper and pencil to do calculations on, so that means he was processing what he had just told me and what he was witnessing. I pulled open my menu and added the others to a call.

"What is up up up?" Ham answered. "Found some cows and slaughtered every last one of them."

"Honestly…" Scarlet whispered.

"York is at it," I said. "There's definitely something wrong." They all went silent. Next thing I known, Ruben and Scarlet are coming towards me from the left, Ham and Annabelle following them. They stopped when they saw the huge blue screen that York had pulled up in front of him. His glasses were glazed over with light: he was intense research mode. The other four gathered around me and tried to make sense of the barrier of blue light that the nerd had created. He was so deep into his research that now he was in a bubble of numbers, letters, and various other symbols that were in other languages.

"What do you think it is?" Annabelle asked, her knees clacking together. I pushed her gently. It was something I did to sort of brush off any bad thoughts they were having.

"It's a game," I coaxed. "Worse comes to worse, we'll log out and wait for them to fix whatever is wrong." York chuckled, as if there was some humor behind what I said. Now Scarlet was lifting her eyebrows in surprise. Ruban picked up some wheat he must've taken from a nearby village and chewed on it anxiously. Ham went silent. Annabelle's knees started clacking.

Whatever York was doing, it was going to take a while. The suspense was killing me, as well as the rest of the group. I approached York, staying out of the way of his bubble. He saw me, sensed my impending question, and looked up to me.

"The game is being hacked," he said simply. "The rules stated that no one is to use creative mode or cheats, but someone is taking everyone's name and compiling them into one set location. It's not a smart move. Having a bunch of players in one area would definitely cause lag, if not a total breakdown of the system, regardless of the amazing connection we have now." The five of us looked back and forth to meet each other's eyes. Then we opened our menu, ready to log out.

I probably looked for it for quite some time before Ham finally spoke up.

"Can't find it," he pouted. "This is frustrating. Usually you just press escape and quit game, but the button's gone." He opened it again. His eye twitched. "Now it's an emoticon of a devil. They must be getting hacked hard."

"That's the concerning part," York whispered. "We can't log out. We're trapped in this game till they fix it." Anabelle started shivering again.

"I… I ordered a pizza. They should be here soon. What will my mom think when she comes into my room and sees me still playing this game instead of paying for it?" She put her hands on the side of her head and started to pull on her hair. "C'mon, c'mon, get this thing off me!"

"No use," York explained quietly. "The brain mapping technology they have paralyzes to muscles so you can only move in your mind. Like in a dream. There's no way to remove the helmet by ourselves. Whoever we live with will have to take it off.

"I live alone," Ruben whispered, cursing himself. "And I can't call anyone from in here. Shit!" He stepped up to York. "Can you get us out of here? Like hack a way out?"

"That's what I've been trying this whole while," York reasoned. "Their barriers are tight. So tight not even light can get through it. It'd take a profession with decades of experience to get past this barrier. Knowing the people who have this game, no one has the capability to log out yet." We all went quiet. Annabelle dropped to her knees and put her hands over her face. Ruben took to a knee and pulled her into his shoulder.

"Don't panic," he said. "York's finding us a way."

"Yeah, Anime," Scarlet said in the most coaxing voice she could make (which was not that impressive). "York's pretty smart. He'll save us."

"The list is about done," he reported. "The hackers will probably gather us up and kill us as a prank. Have your weapons ready, just in case we have a chance against them."

The lights around us flashed brightly. I felt a sharp stabbing pain in the side of my head. My legs went weak and I fell to the ground like a rag doll. My health whittled down slightly, but I had eaten not long before, so it started to regenerate. But I couldn't get up. I couldn't move my head. From where my eyes were set, the others were exactly the same. I could only blink my eyes.

Silence enveloped the group as we squirmed mentally to free themselves. I couldn't tell how long we sat there. I know that a minecraft day wasn't that long, but when the sun set, I couldn't help but feel this is how I would die: lying on the bed in my room, waiting for someone on the outside to come in and free me. Like Ruben, I lived alone. I didn't have anyone who came over often, either. I was utterly alone.

I closed my eyes. Now that I had nothing to do but focus on the ground, I felt a weak dripping down the side of my head where the stabbing pain had knocked all of us to the floor. Was… was I bleeding? In the real world? Now that I thought of it, my whole body ached. When I had fallen in the game, I had been hurt.

Hurt by a virtual reality.

"M… M… Marshy?" York whispered, his voice hoarse. It took a lot of time to warm up my muscles to speak, but when I did, what came out was garbled. I had to say it a few more times before he could understand.

"Y… yes?"

"The… Omniscient had a needle in it…" I felt my throat begin swell at the epiphany. "It was put on for better neuro scans… but I feel like we were just injected with a tranquilizer."

"Why…? Scarlet whispered. "We were already… already lying down. We can't log out… why would they... need that?"

"It's not just tranquilizer," Ruben realized. "The fall… as soon as I fell… I could feel my knees peel from the fall." He struggled to find the words to say. "Are they… making us feel pain… that actually happens in… the game?"

"I felt it, too." Ham sounded too fearful to make jokes. "My elbows are killing me. And my palms, too."

"That kind of injection…" York said. "It doesn't exist. Unless it made… it made the brain trick itself into think we're in pain when we really aren't. You still feel the pain, but there is no… real scarring or infliction on the body. Like I said… it's still in testing."

"Not anymore." A face came up on all our screens. It was the face of Herobrine that smiled and winked at us menacingly. "Hello, players. You must be wondering what the hell just happened, right?"

My group was scared into silence. "Wow," the Herobrine said whilst showing pearly white teeth. "The silence that shocked the Overworld. Don't worry about the pain in your head, we just had to keep you still while the Omniscient did its' thing." The camera zoomed out and it showed the full body of HeroBrine. He waved, did a few punches, and performed a perfect backflip. "Don't mind me. I just like being able to move while almost half of America can't." He clapped his pixelated hands together. "Give me a quick sec, gotta get you all rounded up."

The screen flashed again. I closed my eyes, the light so brilliant I was dizzied by it. When I opened them, I was standing in the center of my group of friends. We were surrounded by millions of people in their geeky or cute skins. As they appeared, they looked down at their hands, their legs, and eventually tried to move, but they were stuck in place. As were I and my gang.

The town square we had spawned in was massive. I know the render distance was cranked up to a hundred thousand blocks, but here, I could see at least a million blocks in every direction. In each coordinal direction, North, South, East, West, there was a living, breathing dragon. I only recognized one: the Ender Dragon. The other three were a mystery to me. One had golden eyes and netherrack and netherstone for skin. The slobber drooling from the corners of his mouth was pure magma. Another had cobblestone for skin and diamond points for horns. His eyes were bright blue like water. The last was by far the biggest, baddest, and most fearsome of them all. He was made of disembodied skeletons and zombies, their blood dripping down onto the stone brick floor. Those close enough to it were nearly covered in thick blood. The eyes of the beast were black holes and on his back was Herobrine, who was laughing and waving around a golden sword like it was a toy.

"Welcome!" he shouted, his voice booming over the millions of people in the gigantic square. "I am your lord and savior, Herobrine! Just kidding, I'm not the real Herobrine. That'd be pretty cool, huh? Nah, I'm just messing with ya!" He started climbing the dragon. When he was on top of the beast's bloody head, he sat between the horns and held his hands up to the crowd. "Welcome to MCO, all of you! According to our calculations, there is approximately forty million people logged on right now. And a lot of you have noticed that there is no logout button. That's ok, it is not a glitch, it is actually just a feature."

"What are you talking about?" someone to my left shouted. "I have to get off now so I can go to dinner!"

"I've got the water running!"

"I have to study for school!"

The crowd was bursting out in outrage. The only people within our seeing distance that had any clue about the situation was me and my five friends. We all each exchanged anxious glances. Annabelle was trying not to let her knees chatter again but it was already happening. York tried pulling up his database menu, but his glasses would flash red and it would instantly close out of whatever screen he had just gotten open. Ruben and Scarlet were looking towards Herobrine with narrowed eyes, analyzing the figure, hoping they could figure out his real intentions.

"Everyone, please," the herobrine called, "calm down. I haven't fully explained what you're doing here."

"Then what are we doing here?!" a person in the back shouted. Herobrine smiled, revealing pearly white fangs. Everyone in the crowd went quiet at the sight of it. They tried moving one way or another, but the hacker kept them strictly in place. I stood and stared up at the menacing figure. What the hell was going on?

"All forty million of you have been selected to perform an experiment," he explained, slowly raising his arms to the air. "Observe." He then threw his hands out in front of him. A gust of wind with sharp pieces of debris in it washed across the crowd, all of which could not flee or dodge it. We all took the brute force of the blow, only able to block with our bare hands, for our inventories had been frozen. I felt the sand and dirt cutting my arms open. that's right, I felt the damage that was being dealt to me in the game. And by the sounds of the crowd around me, everyone else was realizing that, too.

"Stop!"

"Ouch!"

"Cut it out, please!"

"I'm begging you!"

By the time Herobrine had his fill of hearing the pained screams, he stopped the flow of air and allowed everyone a chance to recover. My team was battered hard. I could tell by the looks on their faces that they had come close to dying in the game. And though it was just a game, being killed in it with real pain was just as terrifying as real life. Annabelle started crying. She tried to drop to her knees but the game refused and held her in place. Scarlet reached towards her in coaxation, but even though she reached back, they were too far apart to touch.

"As you can see, you can now feel the pain you experience in the game." Herobrine stood on top of the dragons' head, cape billowing in the wind. "You're all wearing Microsoft's famed invention: the Omniscient. It was meant to be totally safe and playable, until now. Me and a few of my coworkers snuck into the corporation and added a few of our own parts to the machine you now wear. The employees there were so stupid, they didn't even notice the giant needle that injected Hyperulim into your brains."

The crowd went deathly silent. "Hyperulim," York whispered to us in chat. "It's what tricks our brains into feeling pain in the game. Don't worry, guys, you won't be in harmed in real life. It'll just hurt like hell, but we won't die."

"Hyperulim is a drug that will trick your brain into feeling pain when there is no real infliction on your body. I thought it'd be fun to add to a game like this." Herobrine pet the horns of the blood dragon, who purred at the feel of his square hands on his body. "It's also a strong tranquilizer, hence the reason why you couldn't move before."

"What are you doing this for?" someone called. Herobrine smiled again.

"I told you, it's an experiment," he explained. "Now that all of you are in this game with Hyperulim in your brain, you can enjoy your MCO experience in style. There's something more I should add." He jumped off the dragon and landed on the stone brick town square, where he started walking among us. "All of you have customized your skins. You won't be needing those anymore."

After he spoke, I felt my flesh burning. I looked down and watched as the skin I had chosen burst into bright flames. The pikachu skin I had chosen disappeared in the rolling fire and left me naked. Well, not naked, but in the clothes I was wearing in real life. Even the leather armor and items we had gathered disappeared. My ginger red hair fell over my shoulders, my blue eyes blinking in surprise. I felt around my body, from my orange tank to my jean shorts. Everything was almost exactly how it was in real life. It wasn't even pixelated. The graphics were flawless. Even my friends had their skins stripped and their real clothes shown.

"Shit!" Ham shouted, covering his nearly naked body. Apparently he had decided to game MCO with only his boxers on. "Put it back! Put it back!" Then he paused. "Well, I guess I could make this work." Then he started showing off his muscles to some nearby girls. "I bet you three want to mine my craft, if you know what I mean." Their faces turned disgusted and they attempted to walk away, but the hackers kept them firmly in place. They resorted to ignoring Ham.

"As you can see," Herobrine said. "We upped the fun of this game and made your characters what you really look like. Isn't that neat? Now, let's get on to the real explanation."

He ascended to the sky. There, he opened his arms. The sky became bright once again, the sun directly behind him. He did a back flip before posing.

"My squad is called the Legion. We are the ones responsible for trapping you in this game. As of right now, all forty million of you are going to help us test what it would be like if they were trapped in a game. The rules are simple: don't hack, don't cheat, don't try and rebel against us. Because we will kill you. Oh yes, that reminds me." He put s hand on the side of his head. "The Hyperulim needle in your brain is to be left in. If anyone on the outside tries to pull it off, the needle is set to give out a deadly dose of Hyperulim. That being said, if you or someone else takes off the helmet, you will die."

The crowd went deathly silent.

"Is this some type of joke?" a brave soul hollered from the crowd. "Why would Microsoft do this?"

"I told you already," Herobrine said. "We are not officially from Microsoft. We are the Legion. We invaded Microsoft, added our own additions to the omniscient, and here we are. They are currently fighting for control of their servers. According to my first command, this hack is being broadcasted all around America, if not the world."

"So you want to see how long we will play this game?" York called. I looked to him, concerned. "Is that all? Or is there some sort of twist?"

"Good question!" Herobrine raised. "Yes, yes. There is a twist. Not only will the Omniscient kill you if anyone tries to remove your helmet, but if you die in the game, you will be killed in real life as well."

Now the crowd was starting to panic. They opened their menus and spammed the spot where the logout button was. Everyone came up short. When they clicked it too much, Herobrines face popped up, smiling and waving his finger.

"Ah, ah, ah," he said repeatedly. "Ah, ah, ah. You can't do that." Now people were trying what Annabelle had done before, pulling on their hair and heads to try and take off the Omniscient. They all failed. Now people were crying, others flailing in their spots in frustration. I just stood there, processing what was happening.

"Are you fuckin' crazy?!" Somebody shouted. "Let us out of here! The prank's gone too far, man! Too far!"

"You still think this is a joke?" Herobrine laughed so loudly that people turned down their headset volume. "You guys are crazy! All that you've seen and this is a joke to you? Get over yourselves! The Legion is in charge now!"

Now the crowd was in full panic. Everyone was still constrained, but they pulled against their restraints like rabid dogs. The air was filled with cries and shouts for help. I tried to mute my headset, but the pause screen had been replaced by a Herobrine that was bent over in laughter, the four dragons around him doing the same. Everyone panicked further. Now people were fainting from shock. Others were punching themselves to see if they were in a dream. Annabelle was crying at one point, but when I looked back she was stiff as a board, glaring at the leader of the Legion with a deep set hatred in her eyes.

"Why are you doing this?" Her shout was so loud that the entire square went quiet. All attention was on her now. "There has to be some reason," she continued. "Some reason why you would start a genocide of this scale! Why? Why would anyone do such a thing?"

Herobrine took a moment to think. "For the lulz," he answered simply. "Just for the lulz." He laughed. "If you wish to make it back to your petty lives, you must defeat all the dragons you see here! The Ender Dragon, the Nether Dragon, the Over Dragon, and my favorite steed," he praised, patting the side of the dragon that dripped blood, "the Undead Dragon." He spread his arms. "Rejoice, all forty million of you! The games have begun!"

Then he disappeared. The crowd started screaming, crying, and all around hollering in terror. I felt my ears beginning to bleed from the sudden burst of noise. My squad opened their menus, glad to see it was back up and working, and muted everyone but each other. I felt the locks holding me in place lift. Right as everyone began to run around in terror, trampling others, I saw my username and the names of everyone in the group appear on the screen. It was for a split second, but I could see that York had found a way to enter creative move and was teleporting the six of us out of there.

I closed my eyes so I didn't have to take in any bloodshed around me. Only when I felt a warm hand touch my shoulder did I open them. Scarlet was shaking me out of my trance. We were in the middle of a jungle this time. Our lucky coordinates were in the top of my screen. We were well out of the way of everybody in the square.

It was then that the six of us gathered together in a huddle, sat down, and went quiet. We were too old to cry, to young not to panic. So we just sat there in each others' arms, calming the shivers that were crawling under our skin.

The real games had begun.

Character Analysis: Annabelle

Username: Anime Eyes

Special Skill: Builder

Favorite Skin: Zelda

In Party With Five Others

Status: Alive. Full Health.

Autosaving…

Game Saved!

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	3. The Real Faces Of Friends Far From Home

Chapter 3

The rest of the gang were fast asleep by the time I finished building the house around them. It started out as a simple square house, but when I realized I still had time before the sun went down, I was able to branch it off from a cube-like box to a six-roomed, one level home. We had gathered plenty of wool, so I was able to make each of us a bed and place one in each of the rooms. After slowly easing each of my team to their new resting spots, the night fell, and everyone slept.

I stayed awake, observing the high resolution fire as it cooked some of the excess beef we had been provided with while making hide armor. Everybody could get at least ten pieces of it at any given time, but I couldn't use all the coal we had. We had to have some toches as well. Luckily I had some sticks, saplings, and other wood items to burn to get the final few pieces of meat needed to eat.

There was some planning to do as well. According to my map, we weren't that far away from where the Legion had made their announcement. There were definitely still people there. And knowing humans nature, there would be a good deal of them that would kill if they grew desperate. They would try and kill my team and I for our items. Some would probably kill for the thrill of it. This anarchy of a world had just started and, judging from how people reacted in the centre, it was not going to be pretty.

Sleep didn't find me that night. Not even grogginess or fatigue hit me. Just the rusty blade of fear that I forced down my throat in a bitter swallow. The first one to wake up was York.

Oh my. I had nearly forgotten that everyone had reverted into the clothes they had currently worn while playing the game. Not only that, but his features from head to toe had been mimicked as well. He wasn't the block-like character that I had come to call Yoshi, but someone else entirely.

His eyes were such a dark brown that I nearly mistook them for black. His eyebrows and hair, pale yellow with the occasional white streak through it, conflicted with it so much that it was obvious he had dyed it in one point of time. There was a look to his features, sharp and angled, that gave him the appearance of an elf. But the most noticeable feature of him by far was his sheer height. The man had to bend his head at an angle to avoid bumping into the ceiling. He wore a tight plaid shirt and baggy jeans with the knees ripped open unevenly. I had never seen any of my team in real life because each one of us was in a different section of the world, but I never expected Yoshi to look so… cool.

He blinked at me. "You never said your hair was that red. It looks like the inside of a red velvet cake, not like the orange most gingers have." His voice had changed too. It didn't even sound like he was using a mic. It was like he was in the room with me, not just talking via a game.

I took a strand of my hair and brought it up to my face. My hair was a dark red, but it was completely natural. I guess I couldn't be called a ginger. My hair was red as blood, not orange like a sunset. I had just thrown on a purple tank with the pokemon Mew displayed on my stomach. My jeans were a different shade of purple, giving my whole outfit a mismatched look. thought I still had my leather armor on, but it was sitting in my inventory, only slightly used.

"You alright, Marsh?" York asked.

"Y-yeah." I faced him. "You never told me you were so… tall." He chuckled.

"I know I'm not what you pictured," he said. "I'm just as smart, however, and I can tell that you've been up all night." He opened his nerd dashboard. "There's not many people around us now, but more are coming our way, escaping the centre. They're going to look for places to settle that aren't populated. We should do the same."

"I say we get underground." Ruben walked into the room. Wow, ok, he was short. Standing next to York made him look like a midget. He noticed this fact and scowled. "I was hoping you'd be shorter than me, but I guess that's not the case." I'm not sure if they were contacts or not, but his eyes were a deep red. His hair was dyed jet black and parted to the side, where he constantly brushed it out of the way to see. He had tight muscles up and down his exposed arms, where polynesian tattoos left barely a patch of skin unmarked by ink. The only tattoo out of place was a blue skull on his left ankle. I don't understand why he would want to wear a leather jacket and studded black jeans while playing Minecraft, but it seemed to fit the rest of his person just fine.

"Underground," York repeated after taking in what he had seen as well. He pulled up his dashboard again. "Believe it or not, there are just as many people below ground as there is above. We would have a better chance keeping to the surface. Less monsters, ability to travel in the daytime, etcetera."

"Does anyone else feel sick?" Annabelle wandered into the room, knees knocking. She leaned against the doorframe, green in the face. The first thing I noticed about her was her hair: from top to bottom it was nothing short of a neon rainbow. And a long one, too. Her hair touched the backs of her knees. Her shirt had the Nyan Cat on it and her skirt, sticking out like a tutu, had the same cat printed on it, doing stationary loops. She had rainbow tights underneath that looked to have been just bought, for the tag was still on the left foot. "I think that stuff they put in our heads gave me an allergic reaction…" She cupped her mouth.

"Do…" whispered Ruben, "Do you wear that stuff to school?"

"Depends on my mood," she said, suddenly better and standing tall. "If I feel lucky, I wear green. If I'm feeling down, I'll wear blue. But the release of MCO excited me so much I got all this rainbow stuff to celebrate!" She took a moment to process what she had said, then leaned back on the door frame, sick again.

"At least you guys are wearing something." Ham stepped out of his room. His red and white striped boxers was the only identifiable article of clothing on his besides his mismatched socks. The obvious high scholar had a bedhead of unruly brown hair. He blinked his dull blue eyes down at himself. "Hopefully they give us a wardrobe to pick from in this game. I don't want to go around looking like this."

"Put on your leather armor," Scarlet stepped into the room. She was wearing a black and red dress that was laced with designs of spiderwebs and skulls. Her pale white face nearly glowed against her black lips and heavily lined eyes. Her high heels made her half a head shorter than York. The deep blue her hair had been dyed was streaked with black and was just barely long enough to pass her shoulders and rest on her collarbones. She wriggled her nose, adjusting the diamond stud nose ring on her left nostril. Her piercing green gaze met each of ours, as if she was challenging someone to comment her appearance. Then, to Ham, "Please. The armor should help with that. At least until we can figure out what to do till then."

"Man," Ham said, partially ignoring her. "You guys all look nothing like what I expected."

"And somehow you look exactly as I pictured," Ruben chuckled. "A complete doofus."

"Enough about appearances," York said. "Pack your things, there's a group of people coming our way." The look of sudden fear came across everyone's gazes. They shut up and started taking down the wood home, the furnaces, and the beds. I stepped outside while they worked and was glad to see the sun had just risen. The bones and rotten flesh of monsters burned by the light had not yet disappeared yet. It was a perfect time to travel.

"Stay where you are." I turned to my left. There was a group of perhaps ten people approaching. Each of them, upon seeing I was unarmed, placed their swords at their feet. The leader of the pack, a man with piercing blue eyes and cherry red hair, kept his in a shaky palm. "We're not here to fight. We require your attention."

"Quit talking like a soldier," one of the girls at his side hissed. "You're going to make people think you're bossing them around." She turned to me. The purple-headed girl in pink pajamas stepped up to me, bowing. Right away I could tell she wasn't from America like I was, so I bowed as well. Her brown eyes shone when she saw it. "Thank you. Look, you were there at the announcement yesterday. The group of people you see here is called the Anti Legion, or the Anti's for short. We are getting as many people as we can to join us so we can find a way out of this hell. Are you or your friends interested?"

I looked over my shoulder. The group was just cleaning up the last few blocks of wood and starting in my direction. I looked back to the purple-haired girl.

"No thank you, but we appreciate the offer," I declined softly. She nodded.

"Then at least take this." She opened her dashboard and pressed a few buttons. I was sent a friend request by her. Her username was EasterEgg. I accepted it. "You look like an experienced gamer. If you're in a pinch, send me a PM." She bowed again. "Thank you, Marshmallow." Then she turned and started off with her group of followers.

I was confused as to how she knew my name until I realized that names were common knowledge here. Above each of our heads was our username highlighted in green. I read the names of her followers. The red head that had approached me first was TribalBorne. The others were Bojangles, Yelter, OverPowerTwin, 420_Cool, and others I couldn't see properly without usernames overlapping.

"What do you think of them?" Scarlet asked.

"They're not bad people," I guessed. "They're just like us: they want to find a way out."

"What do we do now?" Ruben asked, organizing the items in his inventory.

"Just as planned," York reminded. "Find a place to settle down.

"We looking at any particular biomes?" Annabelle questioned. "We should probably stay away from ocean and desert. Those are unlivable."

"Let's just choose one way to go and stick to it!" Ham announced, putting his arms around York and I. "Let's get moving! There's a whole world ahead of us, and it's only day two! I can't imagine the awesome things that'll be in this game!"

"Besides the whole getting killed if we die thing?" I muttered.

"Don't ruin the game for me yet, Marshy!" He released the two of us and ran forward, clicking his heels together as he jumped in the air. "I'm gonna win!"

"Please," Scarlet whispered, "tell him to put some clothes on…"

Character Analysis: Ruben

Username: Righteous God

Special Skill: Underground Survivalist

Skin: Stock

In Party With Five Others.

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	4. Immortal Object? What Is This Guy?

Chapter 4

"We have enough wood to last us for a good couple nights worth," Ruben announced. "We can stop cutting trees." Ham, who just finished up chopping down one of the shorter jungle trees. He gathered the pieces, having to manually pick them up instead of the normal step forward and automatically gather, and started arranging his inventory.

"We could have done that much faster by cutting the taller trees," he muttered in obvious disdain. I had forced the group and him especially to stick to the ground while we traveled the jungle biome we had just to escape from. I didn't want any of my players killed, so I had grown paranoid. We weren't doing our usual dangerous endeavors. We would wait and then slowly build our abilities back up.

"We got the wood we needed," Ruben snapped at him. "Quit whining. It's better to get a feel for the game before we go throwing ourselves off the tops of trees."

"We were able to cover more land this way, too," Annabelle pointed out. "It's a shame the game is set to large biomes. It hardly looks like we've gone anywhere…" She checked her inventory and started gnawing on a piece of beef I had cooked the night before. "It sucks that we can't taste the food in this game. I'm really hungry…"

"Knowing my family, they'll probably hook me up to an IV in the hospital," York realized. "I guess it's only a matter of time before that's where everyone who's playing this game ends up." We all went silent at that.

"It will be fine," Scarlet said in her emotionless voice. "If anything happens to us, it'll be by something in this game."

"We need to make shelter." Annabelle stopped us. We all looked towards the sky. the sun was setting, slowly, but it was going to be dark soon. Annabelle looked to me, eyes firm, and spoke in a tight tone. "I know you don't want us to, Marshy, but we need resources. We can't keep wasting time sitting in a house above ground while the night looms. We need to get underground."

"I agree," York said. "The traveling we've done today has separated us from nearby people. We can make a home here until the resources are drained or until something else forces us to move." I sighed through my nose.

"I'll begin working," Annabelle declared. "The rest of you can decide what to do." She pulled out some jungle logs. "Move, all of you. I'm going to need some space." We backed away. The other four members of my team watched her work in patient silence until I spoke up.

"If we want to do this right, we'll do it my way." I faced the others. "Scout out for a mine entrance. Don't enter it, alert the rest of us and we'll go in together. While we are underground, do not stray from the path, the group, or the light." The four of them nodded, then separated. We searched the immediate area and started outwards, chopping away any branches that obscured the ground or patchy areas of dirt that could have hidden a cave beneath them.

I had barely started working when I came across a wall of leaves that was obviously human made. I punched out the first block and was right away greeted by light as it flooded outwards. Afraid that other players were nearby, I held back my urge to call the rest of the group. I punched out two more blocks, making the door large enough for me to fit through. Inside was indeed another player, but his skin hadn't been altered to fit his human self like my team had. He still wore the stock Steve skin, casually cooking some steak in a furnace.

He turned to me. For someone who had a stock skin, it had quite the resolution. Liquid clear purple eyes, jeans that had every stitch etched into perfection, and a shirt that had some leaves on it from working in the secret room. For a second he paused as I stared at him, then returned to cooking.

"Hey," I started, "what are you doing here?" He turned back to me, this time confused. He opened his inventory, and right away I could see that he had access to creative mode. "How are you doing that? The world is set on hardcore." Now his face cleared, as if he had come across an epiphany. He closed his screen.

"You can see me, then." His voice was strong and powerful. Several pixels in the room glitched after he had spoken. I looked around, making sure that nothing was attacking from outside, and turned back to him, silent. He stepped to the side, back, then to the other side. I followed him with my eyes. "I suppose you can." He waved his square hand. "You able to talk, Maria?"

"How'd you know my name?" I asked. My nameplate still read Marshmallow Unicorn. Had he been following us? No, York said that nobody was nearby. And even if they were, the team didn't call me Maria. I looked down to my map.

He wasn't displayed on it.

"What, you don't like being called Maria?" He squinted at me. "Marshmallow Unicorn. That's a pretty girly username." I drew my stone sword.

"Who are you?" I asked, my voice low. "Why can't I see you on my map?" Steve paused.

"Trust me, honey," he started, "I'm not here to start anything. I'll leave in a second."

"Answer my question first," I started, moving myself so I blocked the entrance. "Who are you?" He started to open his inventory, but I had been startled too much to think rationally. I darted forward and slashed at him. I felt a jolting shock run its' course around my body. Lights flashed in my eyes and I found myself on the floor, where my health bar had dropped to half a heart. The pain that followed was nothing short of miserable.

Steve looked down on me. I looked away, ready for him to finish me, but he instead made a clicking sound with his tongue.

"Now look what you did, Maria. You nearly killed yourself." I squinted at him. He had no username, just a the purple words IMMORTAL OBJECT above his head. "Don't do that again. My programming prevents me from killing anybody on accident, so you're fine. But if you do that again, I will have to ask you to leave." He put a hand on my head. A rush of soothing and chilled blood started pulsing through my veins. It was only for an instant, but in that instant my health and hunger fully regenerated. Even my fatigue had been restored. I sat up slowly. "There. You'll be just fine now." He turned away from me and walked back over to his furnace, where he sat, warming his hands to the flames.

I sat there for what could've been a few minutes. He glanced at me once, twice, then on the third time, he faced me, a questioning look in his eyes. He was prepared to ask a question, but I spoke first.

"Who are you?"

"You sound like a broken record," the mysterious man muttered. "Steve. I'm Steve. I'm sure you've heard of me. You bought this game didn't you?"

"No, I mean who are you really?" He narrowed his eyes at me.

"I suppose I could give you a fake name like John Smith or Anthony Thomas, but that wouldn't be the truth, and I prefer to keep a limit on my lies. I'm Steve. Is there anything about that name that seems off to you? Do I not look like a Steve or something?"

"It says you're an immortal object." He looked up towards his nametag.

"Oh. So it does." He lifted his hand to it, tapped it gently, and the purple lettering typed out his name in fancy cursive. Muttering under his breath, he erased it and replaced it with normal arial font like mine. "There you go. Steve. Now go back to your friends. They found that mine you were talking about." I opened my mouth to reply, but York's call interrupted me.

"Everyone! There's a mine over here!" I glanced at the door I had punched in, then back to Steve.

He had vanished, and so had his furnace. The leaves he had set up around him started breaking like they did when the tree had been cut away beneath them. I was suddenly exposed to the growing darkness, confused, surprised, and all-around terrified.

What had I just witnessed?

"Marshy!" Ham called. "C'mon! We need a leader!" I snapped to it. I backed out of what was left of the leaf hut and into the growing darkness. Scarlet, Ham, Ruben, and York were waiting not too far away, each holding a torch high in the air so I could see. I pulled out one of my own and approached them. "What kept ya up?"

"Nothing," I said quickly. I stepped forward slowly and peered into the cave that they had found. It started out as a drop into a small crater that was flat at the bottom then dove deep down in direction. From where we were standing, there was no steep inclines to be weary of. There weren't any monsters, either. The sun was setting, however. So we hopped down to the stone floor.

Everyone winced at the slight pain they felt upon losing the half heart from falling damage. They all paused.

"I forgot you could feel real pain in this game," Scarlet whispered. "I can't imagine what it would be like to fall from much higher than that." Oh, it was painful. Of that I was sure.

"Annabelle," I called, "are you going to be alright by yourself?"

"I'd prefer a building buddy," she called back.

"I'll take care of it." York hopped from one block to the next until he was back above ground. He turned back to me. "You four stay safe. I'll keep an eye out for anything above the surface on the radar." Then he turned away and started towards Annabelle.

"Bout time!" she scolded in the background. "You're pretty tall, knock down that block I placed in the tree by accident." I turned to the others.

"Ready?" I asked. Ruben pulled out a sword in one hand and a pickaxe in the other. Ham grabbed just his sword, and Scarlet hers. "Let's go." Them following closely behind, we dove our way into the darkness. I was the first one to set the torch on the wall. Only then did I feel something that was felt often.

I was afraid.

Character Analysis: Scarlet

Username: Sacred Goddess

Special Skill: Assassin

Skin: Stock

Currently In Party With Three Others

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	5. There's More To This Than We Thought

Chapter 5

"God," Ruben whispered for the fifth time. "There's just so much of everything we need. On your left, Scar." The skilled assassin, without looking back, thrust her sword under her left armpit, impaling a zombie right through the heart. Like it had before, a robotic voice chimed in the background.

"Critical Hit!"

The zombie crippled to the ground before poofing out of existence, leaving behind some experience points and two pieces of rotten flesh. Scarlet bent down and picked up the green ball of experience, peering closely at it.

"It's not like the main game," she reported to me as I broke the last block of iron ore for Ruben to gather. "I've gathered a lot of these and I'm only halfway to level two. There must be a different use of levels in this game other than enchanting and repairing items." She paused. "I guess the Legion must've changed it a bit. If you think about it, it'd be useless to use levels just for enchanting when it comes to life or death gaming like this. Maybe our levels are like in other RPGs. Get stat boosters and new items."

"We'll have to wait and see." Ruben stood up and brushed his hair out of his eyes. "There's a ton of ore in this cave. More than we'd ever really need to go too far down for. Why do you think that is?"

"There's forty million players online," Scarlet reasoned. "They must have made more than needed to support us. When it runs out, people will have to travel further and further to spawn new chunks and get the resources, though. So there's really no shortage of anything."

"There's something we're missing," I realized. "Where's Ham?" Scarlet and Ruben looked around. I nearly had a heart attack until I saw him just out of the reach of the further torch down the tunnel. His gaze was stuck on his feet, where he crouched. I approached him slowly. the closer I got to him, the more I saw that he was out of reach of our light, but in front of him, light was pulsing in deep orange. I crouched and came up on his side.

The two of us were perched on an overhang that looked over a mass of lava. It was a dome-shaped ravine with the entire walls covered with nothing but precious minerals and ores that would be necessary to the survival of my team. There were even blocks I hadn't seen before. Purple, pink, and orange stones that resembled other ores were some of the more common ones on the side of this treacherous room. It wasn't completely empty, however. Above the lava and defying gravity like some blocks in MineCraft could were stepping stones up to ledges where one could easily access and mine their way to any mineral they pleased. There were several of these paths, but you only needed one to get to the other side.

You had to be good at parkour courses in order to reach it.

"I know what you're thinking," I whispered to Ham, "and I'm telling you to stay here." Ham didn't respond. His eyes were lost in deep thought. Behind us, the chiming of multiple bells tolled. I turned and saw Scarlet's body glow brightly for just a second before a green 0 appeared above her head. Her body flashed in brilliance, and the zero became a 1. Then the light ceased and an enchanted wooden sword dropped into her hands from the darkness.

"Just what I thought," she whispered. "The levels aren't for enchanting. They're just for prizes and a stat boosts." She lifted her head from the sword to talk to me, but her jaw dropped in surprise. Knowing right away that Ham had gone against my instructions, I turned to the lava, where I prayed he hadn't fallen.

Sweet Jesus.

He was already on the other side.

Ruben and Scarlet stepped up to my sides, where they paused to crouch and secure their footing before drawing too close to the edge. The lava, bubbling in disgust, nearly splattered us with a drop of molten plasma.

"I know he's stupid," Ruben whispered, "but I didn't think he'd have the guts to do that."

"He's better at parkour than any of us," Scarlet reminded. "This must be a cakewalk for him. The only thing I see him doing wrong is freaking out."

"Ham!" I called. "Get back here right now!"

"Amethyst, pearls, rubies, steel, copper, and so much more," he replied. "This game has so many more minerals than we've ever thought before." He turned to us, arms working to get the ores organized in his inventory. "Imagine how many more things you can use these for! I don't know what they'll do, but I'll grab one stack of everything, just to be sure!"

"Ham, this is no longer a game, it's a matter of life and death!" He continued mining, despite my nagging. "Get back here and we can mine our way around this room."

"Negative on that one, Marsh." Ruben had just mined the wall to our right. Behind a one-block thick layer of stone and ore was bedrock. The option was either parkour or build a bridge, and everyone knew that Ham was too impatient for the second choice.

"Alright," Ham called. "Inventory is full. I'm on the way back." He turned around and analyzed his surroundings, choosing which parkour route to take. When he had decided, he started hopping his way back to us. It was hard enough to see him do it so carelessly, but I nearly died when his foot slipped and he started to fall backwards.

Ruben cursed and looked away. I put my hands on my head and tried not to scream. Scarlet threw a hand out towards him, regardless of how far he was from her. Right when he began to fall, an icy blue stream of dust shot out of Scarlet's hand and hardened right under Ham. He hit the newly created block back first, slid a short ways, then came to a slow stop.

Everyone froze, then slowly turned to Scarlet. Like she had suddenly inherited the powers of spider woman, a web of ice had been produced from her wrist all the way to Ham. Strings of the frozen tendrils connecting her to the block under Ham started melting from the rays of heat produced by the lava, so Ham got to his feet and hopped back to safety on the block he had tripped on. The ice melted and became water, which doused some of the lava and hardened into obsidian, along with various other minerals that I knew Ham no longer felt a need to gather.

"What…?" Ruben whispered, delicately grabbing Scarlet's arm and looked at it. Her whole hand was blue and shedding snowflakes. "Since when did you become Elsa?"

"Hey!" Ham called. "Do what you just did, but make a path for me back over there?" Scarlet stared blankly. While Ruben and I exchanged glances, the assassin repositioned herself, stuck out her hand, and closed her eyes. Only when the silence progressed to awkwardness did the flow of ice start pulsing from her hand once again, creating a path of frozen blocks from Ham to her. Regardless of nearly falling to his death already, the foolhardy teen ran towards us. If he thought the path was going to melt, he was right, but it melted away fully a minute after he returned.

I tugged him away from the edge by his ear. He whined the whole way. As soon as we were safe, I released him.

"Don't do it again," I hissed. He bowed his head, averting the fierce look in my eyes. I turned towards the others. "Do we have everything we need?"

"More than enough," Ruben answered. "Iron, gold, coal, stone, and the various things Ham collected."

"Don't," I interrupted, "remind me." I turned towards where we had come from. "We're going to the surface. Scarlet, I'm going to have York run a check on you to make sure what you have isn't dangerous." She nodded. "Ruben, lead the way." He pulled otu his swords again, nodding his head once before darting past me and up the stairs. Scarlet followed, and when Ham looked ready to pursue, I reached forward and hugged him. He froze. "Don't you ever do that again, you hear me?" His tensed form relaxed. "There's only six people in this world I know now. I don't want to lose any of you." I pulled away. He had a faint smile on his face.

"You love me, don't you?" he asked, chuckling.

I punched him right in the face, knocking him down to the floor. Ruben and Scarlet looked back, but Ham was already on his feet, pretending it hadn't happened.

"Of course I love you, you dumb idiot," I said. "Where would this group be without loving each other?" He raised a hand to question. "No, I'm not dating you." He made a mockery of a disappointed face. When I lifted me fist again, however, that all went away.

"Right, right, right," he said quickly. "No more dangerous stunts, I got it."

"Good." He started up the stairs, me behind him. I gathered torches on my way up, and I was glad that it was dark.

Because I had started to silently let tears fall down my cheeks. I couldn't imagine being responsible for the death of any of my friends. I couldn't handle losing them either. That had scared me more than enough.

And the game had only begun.

Character Analysis: Ham

Username: Hard Ass MoFo

Special Skill: Combative Expert

Skin: Stock

In Party With Three Others

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	6. Four Rogues Or Four Heroes?

Chapter 6

York had said he was wearing glasses in real life, but in the game, they must've not registered because when he went to adjust them, they did not appear on his face. He was scanning Scarlet's arms with one of his nerd programs, typing in numbers and words that made no sense to get likewise answers that made even scratch his head.

Ham was hunched over the chest in the main room, busily organizing his pickings from the cave, casually humming a song to himself as he did it. Ruben put a foot on his back and push forward, forcing Ham's head deep in the pile of rocks and ores.

"Don't think we haven't forgotten about what you did," Ruben hissed. "You're lucky Scarlet turned into Elsa for a few minutes, or you wouldn't be here." Ham lifted his head.

"I got so much cool stuff though," he whispered in disappointment. "Just look at this st-" Ruben pressed on his back again, dipping his head back under the piles of gems again.

"Ruben, Ham, stop it," I snapped. "If we start fighting now, we're not going to last long."

"It's a built in feature," York announced, attracting all of our attention. We gathered around him. "When you reach level one, a randomly selected power is installed in your player coding. I can't get ahold of what the different powers are, but there a ton of them. Thousands, if not millions. They're called Special Abilities."

He paused. "As you already know, Scarlet's Ability is ice. When the rest of you reach level one, we'll be able to tell what yours are."

"That sounds like a pretty unique feature for MineCraft…" I muttered.

"Oh, Microsoft didn't add this," York assured. "The Legion did. I scanned some of the items Ham retrieved as well. They're not part of the original coding. Those and the Special Abilities were added hastily right at the beginning of the game. The hackers are well-trained. They added so many different mods of their own to this game flawlessly within an hour. Hacking Microsoft was an easy feat for them. They won't be taking control back anytime soon."

A loud simmering interrupted us. The six of us turned to the door, which had suddenly caught fire. Scarlet was quick to freeze the flames before they spread a block further. A scuffling outside was heard, followed by a loud curse.

I was the first out the door, shattering it with my iron sword to get by. There were four men outside the house, each holding an iron sword of their own. However, their weapons were well worn, and all they wore was an iron chestplate and leather boots. All four of them were already panting, their health and hunger bars low.

"Give us all your stuff!" the man on the far right shouted. His accent with thickly marked with Asian descent. His eyes, such a bright blue that I could see them clearly under all his unruly hair. His pants were torn and his hands battered.

"Hurry it up," shouted a boy next to him. This kid couldn't have been older than ten, and already the look of desperation and hate was set in his eyes.

"They're up ahead!" a voice called from over the hill behind them. The four turned, frozen in panic. Then they looked to each other, looking just about ready to collapse from exhaustion. I was utterly confused at what was happening until I saw a banner poke over the hill. It was designed with the face of Herobrine in a square formed by the four different dragons.

They were being sought at after by the Legion.

I reacted first, reaching forward and taking the boy by the arm. He lifted his sword as if he meant to strike, but he stopped himself when I shoved him inside the house, scattering my team in confusion. York, the least befuddled by my actions, grabbed two others by their wrists while I took the leader, who was almost too exhausted to catch up as I ran him inside the house.

"Start lying," I hissed to York. He nodded, knowing full well what I meant. As soon as the leader was inside the house and the door was shut behind him, I threw paintings up over every window on the main floor, leaving my five teammates outside.

"You five!" I heard an unfamiliar voice call from outside. "Have you seen four players cross here?"

"Who are you?" Annabelle asked, oblivious. I peeked through the tiny window on the door. Oh my lord. There were probably thirty able-bodied players out there in enchanted diamond armor, all holding various weapons from scythes to hammers to battle axes. The one that had spoke was the one holding the banner, which fluttered in the nonexistent breeze. He was a man with a scar running from his left cheek to the right, leaving a dark crevice on the bridge of his nose. He frowned, and the scar wrinkled.

"I am the Legion's Overworld Advisor, General Night Crawler. You may call me sir, Annabelle." My teammate checked to make sure her username hadn't spelled out her name, which it hadn't. If he knew her real name, there was no doubt he had access to her personal records. That meant he wasn't lying. He had to be a member of the Legion. "We are looking for four players that have possibly run this way. They have committed crimes against the Legion and are wanted for a sentence."

"We haven't seen anybody," York lied fluently. "We heard you yelling and came out to see the commotion. If they passed, we have missed them." Night Crawler approached York. Though my teammate was much taller, the General met his eyes with no hint of fear.

"Keep your eyes out next time, or you might just lose them." The general hit the but of the banner against the ground and the men pressed forward, passing around our house with eyes that scanned the area more than thoroughly. As they progressed out of sight, the five of my teammates turned to York, confused. I ducked back in the house and approached the men, all of which were curled up on the floor painfully.

Annabelle, Ruben, and Scarlet were the first ones to enter. "Get the other three, you guys. I'm going to talk to the leader." They exchanged glances, but didn't protest. Gingerly, the three of them were lifted from the ground and taken to a spare room that Annabelle had meant for storage but had not yet got to decorating. They each took a good amount of food and sponges to clean the wounds. I know they weren't going to have wounds in reality, but the chance of infection in the game could drop your health just enough to kill you.

I lifted the last of the men and set him on my bed, where he narrowed his eyes at me.

"Why'd you save us? Now the Legion will want you, too." I picked up an apple and held it out to him. He took it and glanced at me, hesitant.

"If I wanted you dead, I would've left you out there, not poison your food." That's when he hastily ate the entire apple. I handed him four more, which he downed with no attempt at cleanliness. "What on Earth were you doing that made that many of them angry?"

"I believe I asked you a question first," he replied, brushing off his shirt. I narrowed my eyes.

"Just assure me it isn't something I'll regret taking you in for."

"You are fully assured." He lie his head down on the pillow, closing his eyes. "Again, why'd you take my men in?"

"Anybody who is an enemy of the enemy is an ally," I replied. "I'm assuming that the Legion aren't really there to pursue righteous justice like normal police would."

"You'd be right." He nodded his head, which was a makeshift bow. This man really was from Asia, wasn't he? "I'm Oblivion Scrolls by username, Okawa by birth." I returned the head nod.

"You can call me Marshy. I'm not a fan of my real name."

"Ah." He sat up with some difficulty. Then, clumsily, he slipped off his iron chestplate and leather boots. His shirt was soaked with virtual blood, which wasn't any less gory than reality, I can assure you.

"How the hell aren't you dead?" I asked.

"I'm level twenty," he said. "Not too much can kill me this close to spawn."

"Close to spawn?" I asked. He eyed me.

"You haven't figured out much of the game yet, have you?" I didn't reply. "The area we were teleported to when the Legion made their announcement is spawn. There's no monsters there. Not even wolves. Just a bunch of cows, chickens, and sheep. The further you travel, however, the more the monsters appear. They're normal at first. Zombies, spiders, skeletons, creepers. An easy kill. But the further out you go, there's beasts you don't even want to look at, let alone fight."

"You've been further out than this, then," I assumed. He nodded, stepped out of the bed, and gestured at a nearby chest, silently asking for permission to rummage through it. I waved, allowing it, and he started going through it, picking out string and wool as well as dye. "How much further have you been?" I asked.

"Further than we should've gone," Okawa admitted. "We were so far ahead of the others that we were the first couple of kids to spawn the next chunks of the map. The Legion set up the new chunks to have more of their mods, their materials, their mobs."

"What were you hoping to get out there?" I questioned. He walked over to the crafting table and right away had set himself up with a new outfit that was free of blood, tears, and sweat. He threw them on the bed, waiting for another time to change. He sat back on the bed, where he met my eyes intensely.

"My men and I are hoping to end this game before too many are killed," he said. "So we went after the Over Dragon." I had to think a minute. The Legion's leader had said that there was a way to end the game: the kill all four of the dragons. The one in the Overworld must be the Over Dragon, then. "We hoped to find it, but the Legion was already weary of us. Our levels are high and our materials were plenty. We were doing just fine. That's when they decided to attack us in our sleep and take everything we had. We got out with a few pieces of food and ran further out into the wilderness, but they took us back to spawn, where that group of losers just about killed us. We got out and ran all the way here. Now it'll take us forever to get back and retrieve everything we had."

"Why would you go after the Over Dragon?" I asked. "I highly doubt it'll be easy. Level twenty isn't much for a video game as extensive as this. I'm sure you'd stand no chance." Okawa stared at the ground. I had the uncanny feeling that he knew I was right. "Why would you try and bring your men to certain death? There's no doubt you knew there'd be no chance of survival." He paused. An epiphany washed over me. "You… wanted to die."

"At least this way it wasn't cowardly," Okawa said. "To die fighting to save forty million players, can you imagine a better way to go?"

"Yeah," I replied, "dying in the real world of old age with a family and kids at your side." He didn't reply. There was a short pause. "To be honest, I don't even think you all wanted to die."

"What are you talking about," he snapped, meeting my eyes with his icy glare. "Of course we did."

"I think if you really wanted to die," I snapped back, "then you wouldn't have ran from the Legion this entire way. You wouldn't have tried burning our house down to escape." The intensity in his stare died down.

"They're all in need of bathing," York said, entering the room. Something told me he had timed his entrance. "If they want the cleanliness health bonus for the night, they better use the spring downstairs." Okawa's face looked relieved. It had been some time since they had a real rest, I assumed. I grabbed the clothes he had set on the bed and handed it to him.

"Get cleaned up, get dressed, and get your thoughts straight. I'll talk to you when you get out." The three of his men walked into the room, all of them looking slightly better. They stepped up to Okawa and waited for his instruction. The man still had his gaze on me. I returned it.

"Which way to the bath?" he asked. I nodded towards a trap door in the corner. Bowing slightly, he started towards it, his men following with narrowed eyes at me. When they had all disappeared downstairs, Ruben punched me in the shoulder.

"Ow," I hissed. "What the hell was that for?"

"Nearly getting us killed on an impulse," he said. "Why'd you have us save them?"

"They're people, just like you and I, Ruben," I said seriously. "If you saw someone on the verge of a miserable death, would you try to save them?" The underground expert looked to the side, then sighed through his nose.

"You're a very merciful person." He met my eyes and smiled. "That's why I'm glad to have you be our leader."

"Thank you, Ruben." I scanned the room, meeting gazes with all my teammates. "Sleep with your swords tonight. The Legion could come back or the four of them could choose to take our lives. Be prepared for anything." I said it loud enough to make sure the ones downstairs heard us. Everyone nodded and spread to their rooms, where they prepared for bed. I did the same.

The Over Dragon, huh?

That'd be a sight to see.

Character Analysis: York.

Username: Yoshi Tamer.

Special Skill: Hacker/Analysis Agent.

Skin: Stock.

In Party With Nine Others.

Autosaving…

Saved!

Would You Like To Continue?


	7. The Oblivion Unicorns?

Chapter 7

"Good morning," I heard someone call. I rubbed my eyes, still half asleep, and sat up. My vision was foggy from sleep and they ached. I hoped my parents had taken the contacts out of my eyes some while before I started the game, or else I might have trouble fighting through this. I blinked, hoping to tell if they had been taken out. There was no definite way of telling if they were still there, but my vision returned to normal.

Okawa and his three men were stepping out of their room. "Ohayo," he repeated, this time in his native tongue. Japanese, I knew Annabelle would freak when she found out-

"OHAYO!" Annabell burst down the door to her room as soon as Okawa had uttered the word. She stepped up to him, eyes wide and sparkling in admiration. "I had no idea you were from Japan! I thought I recognized the accent!" Okawa blinked in surprise.

"Oh. Yeah. The anime thing." He looked to his right, as if he had this same incident happen to him before.

"Annabelle," I whispered. "Not the time." She looked back at me, puppy eyes begging for her to continue. I hated to do it, but I shot her down with a glare. Sticking out her lower lip with crossed arms, she walked to the side, where York was just emerging. He lowered his eyes at Okawa.

"Any reason we're up before the monsters burn?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes." Okawa and his men put their fists over their hearts in some sort of salute. "We'd like to form a guild with the five of you."

"Oh, no." Ruben, who had been leaning against the doorframe with narrowed eyes, stepped in. "We're not joining any guild with people who attempted to burn down our house."

"On the contrary," York put in. "Joining guilds with multiple people might be just what we need." He opened his menu. "I've been looking over some of the features of this game, and the guild system is interesting. Whenever a certain member defeats an enemy, they gain all the experience of the kill, but a second amount of the experience goes to the other team members, split up randomly. There is also a chance of items dropped, mined, or received from loot chests being duplicated and given to other players as well. Plus, the party system lets you know the health, hunger, and the location of other party members. You can also initiate trades with others, regardless of how far away they are."

"And the bad side of it?" Scarlet questioned.

"They have the ability to find us wherever we are, and keep track of our levels."

"I am level 18," one of the young boys beside Okawa stated. Something told me the kid was the second in command. He couldn't have been a day over ten years old. One of his baby teeth had yet to fall out. His shirt had the YouTuber Tobuscus on it, his pajama pants were decorated with tens of small smiling creepers, and he had a hat with the Johto Pokemon starters on it. Regardless of looking like he couldn't perform anything more complicated than second grade math, the boy had a set of diamond boots and an amethyst sword. His eye was covered by a poorly cut patch of leather, a scar peeking out from under it. His stare was not innocent. This boy had seen blood, and not the cute splatter of it like in Minecraft minigames, but blood that had been spilt by the buckets from friends, monsters, and strangers. "You can call me Spellend, a magic expert. My ability: fire."

"Fire, huh?" Scarlet smacked her jaw out of habit, she didn't have any gum on her in this game. She must've been thinking about how to take apart this kid if he ever found out anything about her novice ice magic. He looked at her and nodded.

The other two of Okawa's men, once silent, stepped forward. Without their armor, I could see the guarded looks on their faces. Both of them had fiery red hair and fierce hazel eyes. One had freckles on his right cheek, the other on his left. The two had a distinctive white streak in their hair, again, on opposite sides. Twins. Exact opposites.

"I'm Para, level 17, this is Perp, level 16." The one on the right gestured to his brother. "I can control the growth rate of plants and animals." He rolled his eyes. Yeah, he obviously thought it was a useless ability. Annabelle, who still had to force herself to keep her distance from Okawa, looked at him with her shimmering eyes like she had found a new lover.

"And I can control the speed at which others can move. Just speed," he added, "I can't slow any of you down. That's apparently some other ability." This twin had a significant feature about him that distinguished him from his brother. The tips of his hair had been dyed black. I made a mental note to ask how he managed to do that.

"And you, Okawa?" Ruben asked.

"Probability," he answered simply. "I can change the odds of nearly anything in this game to my favor. Monster drops, critical hits, and other things I haven't quite figured out yet." If what he was saying was true, then he was powerful. No wonder they were so far in the game already, he had basically hacked his way through it. Maybe that's why the Legion wanted him, he was a hack within a hack. Maybe he could've hacked the chances of defeating the Over Dragon to an extreme amount and they had to stop him.

"We agree to the guild." Ruben and Scarlet looked to me like I had punched an old lady. Annabelle squealed in delight. York nodded once. I wasn't sure where Ham was, probably sleeping. "We're still low levels, only one of us has found our powers so far, so don't expect much experience points coming from us."

"We don't care about the experience points, we care about finding others to join our cause."

"Defeating the Over Dragon," I clarified.

"Yes." Now my four members looked scared to death. They hadn't been there for yesterday's conversation, I remembered. Oh well, better late than never. "We expect you to prepare for battle with it eventually."

"Just the nine of us?"

"Other guilds will join, I am sure." He smiled faintly. "But I'd rather just have a guild with your team and mine, to keep it on the safe side." That smile, I couldn't read it. I couldn't figure out why he had to smile to say that. Was it dastardly? Plotful? Romantic? No, it just appeared… happy.

"What about the name?" Ham walked into the room at this point. He still hadn't figured out how to put clothes on his character so Okawa and the others were surprised to be greeted by a man in just underwear. "I say we give ourselves a name like 'The Hard Ass Mofos!'"

"No," everyone said at once.

"Something simple," Okawa said. "My username is Oblivion Scrolls, and yours is Marshmallow Unicorn. How about Oblivion Unicorns?"

"Pfft," York chuckled. "No one would take us seriously."

"Then let them think we're not." He held a hand out to me instead of bowing. Did that mean he was giving me a position higher than him? "The Oblivion Unicorns will be formed with you as our leader, if you accept." I took his hand. A notification popped open on my screen.

Congratulations!

Guild Oblivion Unicorns Has Been Formed!

Leader: Marshmallow Unicorn

Moderators: Yoshi Tamer, Oblivion Scrolls, Spellend

Members: Anime Eyes, Righteous God, Sacred Goddess, Hard Ass MoFo, Parallel, Perpendicular

Objective: Defeat Over Dragon

Autosaving…

Game Saved!

Would You Like To Continue?


	8. Criminals and Clothes!

Chapter 8

"Absolutely not."

"York, please."

"I refuse on every level!"

"Please? For me?"

"That won't work, Annabelle." York turned his back on the two of us and crossed his arms. "I don't deal well with people, let millions of players who are forced here against their will."

"York, we have to buy several items that we don't know how to get," I started. "Tin? Plastic? Mirror? There's no guide on this game, and if we want to progress any further, then we're going to need outside help. And the only safe place to find that is in the city."

"Your hopes are too high," Ruben agreed from the kitchen, where he angrily tore into his steak. "The chances that people made actual shops and are not just tearing each other apart is too low. I don't care that PVP is disabled in Legion City, I don't see any gain in it."

"Exactly," York snapped.

"It doesn't matter if you don't like people or not," Scarely snapped pointedly. "We need materials, we need information, and most of all, we need to meet some other people." She jabbed a thumb at the door. "Ever since those four left, the five of you have been driving me insane. Mining, cooking, farming, I'm sick of it. We've completely emptied this entire area around us anyway, we need to relocate."

"I have to go with the girls on this one," Ham added. "The monsters here aren't giving us enough exp either, I want to kick ass eventually, not in five years!" It was true, everything they were saying. The mobs were so weak none of us had leveled up to find our ability like Scarlet had underground, the land only gave us wheat and it wasn't growing fast enough to really sustain us, the trees had been cleared and the mine within thousands of blocks had been emptied, and to be honest, it was getting boring. Don't hate me for saying being trapped in a game that meant life or death was boring, but it was getting there. We were getting nothing done.

Ruben rolled his eyes. The punkster hated people. _Hated_ them. He just didn't see the good in them and preferred a life of solitude. Minus us, of course. One can only go so long being alone before loneliness kicks in. He could live off just talking to the five of us. York didn't mind talking to people and going out, but from what I've seen of him before, he had extreme fears of crowds. That and he was an anxious wreck around strangers. I hated doing this to him, but we had no choice.

"We're going," I declared. "We need better food, materials, and more importantly, clothes." I glanced at Ham, who was trying to sniff his underwear. His face scrunched up painfully when he got a successful smell of it.

"Alright, alright." Ruben threw his hands in the air. "I get it." He turned his back on us and kicked at the nearest furnace. When it shrunk, he picked it up and shoved it in his inventory. He was angry, but he wasn't dealing with Ham's stench any longer. Why add smells to this game anyway, I wondered.

York opened his map. "Let's just get going now. Maybe someone can complete our maps so it doesn't just show where the six of us have been, as well as Oblivion and the others." He tapped something on his screen. "They're straying far from the center again…"

"They can handle themselves." I tried to hide the sound of doubt I felt forming at the words. The four of them had basically tried to kill themselves out of misery, but I refused to tell them that. Maybe joining a guild had given the four of them a real reason to fight the Over Dragon. At least I hoped.

All six of us worked together to disassemble the house, farm the crops, and gather the chests. We were done within fifteen minutes and on the road as York led us through the jungle he had once teleported us into.

"We can ask for trades from Oblvision," Ruben muttered angrily.

"They were low on supplies when they arrived a few days ago," I responded, "and they will be low on supplies if we contact them. We need things in bulk, anyway."

"Do you think that minecraft days match Earth days?" Annabelle asked, eyes to the sky.

"I hope so," Ruben responded. "If we keep falling asleep when it's not night in the real world, if we wake up we're going to have a hard time adjusting." No one responded. I think they were just as worried as I was that he used the word 'if' in that sentence.

After about an hour, maybe two hours of walking, the grass started to thin and the trees began to appear on the sides of the forming trail in decorative patterns. Colorful leaf blocks formed tall hedges. Moving further along, the hedges began to take the shapes of different objects and people, most of which related to the game itself. There was a sword crafted out of some sort of light blue leaves, a creeper with neon lime leaves, and a tall, more than plentiful statue of Herobrine in different dominant poses. Each one was made of a different kind of leaf block, none of them pleasant. One set of leaves were made of red brambles, another of maggot-looking vines, one of shredded black thorns, and the last just a black block that left a puddle of sickly green goo growing at the feet of the figure. For a moment, the six of us were in the direct line of every statue's sight. I had a feeling they were watching us, all of us did. But we didn't acknowledge it.

After a while of wading through the statues that were now nothing but creepy Herobrine lawn decorations, a giant wall entered our render distance. At first it looked like it was made of brick, but closer inspection, it looked to be made of some sort of red and orange mosaic tile that gave the wall a reflecting glare. From our distance we were blinded by this until we approached closer. It was there that we saw what looked to be a mockery of an Egyptian hieroglyph. At the far left of our vision, it portrayed a Herobrine placing a cheap mask over his face and entering a building with the Microsoft logo printed blatantly on the front. Moving to the right showed the progression of this Herobrine character building his way up through the ranks of Microsoft, making false friends and gaining trust. As it went alone, I saw this Herobrine tampering with several of their items, only one of which was the Omniscient. When he had made his way so high up the ladder I doubt he would've been able to go much farther, the hieroglyph stopped and portrayed him opening his arms to a crowd of millions of people, who I could only guess was the players of MCO. Giant fancy cursive in the sky that read 'WELCOME BACK!' almost directly above our heads flashed in welcome as we pushed past the haunting stare of the wall and up to the large gate.

Two bulky guards stepped in our path from around the other side of the wall. They both didn't look too prepared to fight anyone. Their iron armor was worn, their swords chipped, and their health didn't seem to be regenerating. One of them threw a rock to the side that he had been idly licking.

"Party of six?" one asked. His head was smooth and hairless, his arms thick, and his face nearly covered by facial hair.

"Yes," I answered for the group. "We just need some supplies."

"That'll cost you about twenty pieces of gold," the other said. This guard had bleach blonde hair and dark brown eyebrows. His left leg was being propped up by a makeshift cane we must've pulled off a nearby tree.

"We don't have any gold." I showed them my hands. "We haven't made any contact with any merchants or traders."

"We can't let you in if you don't have the cash." The bald guard raised his nose to the air. "Maybe you should consider coming back with fifty gold pieces."

"How do you expect people to get money if they can't access the city?" Ruben glared at them. "I suppose you two aren't really guards, are you? You're probably just looking to make an extra buck."

The two ruffians glanced at each other, shrugged, then pulled out their swords. The six of us did the same, almost quicker than they did. Of course, when they saw that the six strangers who brandished high-degree weapons like crystal bows and emerald shields were ready to attack as one giant mob, the two of them threw their swords to the bushes. They had obviously had this problem before, and they weren't willing to try anything more. When their weapons had been disposed of, they turned tail and ran into the city, losing each other in two separate directions. We waited a good minute to see if they returned, then sheathed our weapons.

"Good call, Ruben." Scarlet returned her bow to her inventory and adjusted her hair.

"You get those kind of people in times like this," he replied. This time, he was the one who led us through the gate. It could've been because he felt he deserved to have a spot up front, or he knew his way around dirty people that might've had a large population in this city.

We stepped through the gate and a chill ran over our bodies. Our forms were pixelated for about five seconds as the game seemed to lag. When it cleared, the six of us found our weapons removed from out hotbars and at the top of our screens with the words PVP DISABLED in large letters written across them in red. Our armor had met the same fate. As soon as the words faded and our items returned to our inventory with large red X's across them, a new set of words appeared across our menus. WELCOME TO LEGION CITY.

"Creative name," York mumbled. We started looking around.

Regardless of the fact that the city had a terrible outside set up and a wall that basically reminded us that we were in a concentration camp, Legion City was… pretty. The buildings were well-designed, clean, and made of every type of wood imaginable from oak to maple and a bunch of colorful varieties that came in shades of purples, greens, and yellows. There were no skyscrapers with the exception of what looked to be either apartment complexes or some sort of office building. The grass and dirt had been replaced by pinkish orange bricks that formed streets that zigzagged all around the city, passing through marketplaces, neighborhoods, and alleyways. Where there wasn't brick roading there were trees and ponds as well as grassy parks and safe parkour courses. Ruben paused when he saw all of it and glanced at me. Then he quickly looked away and continued to lead us. There were children laughing and people smiling everywhere, but he didn't trust them. Not a single one.

"Fresh pumpkin pies?" a taller woman with pigtails offered as we walked by a sweet-smelling shop that had been crowded with players. She held a pie out the window and blew it's scent in our direction, nearly drawing Ham and Annabelle to a stop if I hadn't grabbed them both by the ears and dragged them directly behind Ruben.

"Fish and diving gear!" a man called this time from the other side of the street, casting an invisible line out to us and pretending to reel us in, eyebrows jumping up and down in expectation.

"Potions and remedies!"

"Plastics and toys!"

"Seeds and saplings!"

"Cloth and clothing!" The six of us paused at that voice. There was a shop, not much different from the rest besides the purple-ish hue that the wood her building was made of, that had a single lady sitting out front. She waved us over and we heeded her call. "No clothes, huh?" Her unreal yellow eyes blinked twice at Ham. "Still stuck with your IRL clothes, huh? Well, I think I have some things that'll cover that up." She looked over at Annabelle. "Oh my, look at those colors! Do they need a wash? They seem to be a bit faded."

"You can do that?" Annabelle asked, tilting her head.

"Of course." She pointed to her username. "I'm known as BearBee16, but you guys can call me Wanda." She pulled off her beanie and let down a mane of hair so yellow it looked almost like it had been dipped in gold. I wasn't sure how old she was. I had guessed about 16 at first glance, but now that I was talking to her, she must've been in her 20's. "Come in, come in. You just missed the morning rush so you don't have to fight anyone."

We followed her inside and, by God, the inside of her shop was nothing but beautiful clothes all around. Dresses made of brilliant silk hung from the ceiling. Suits with bizarre patterns like jack o lanterns, pink poodles, broken DVD's, unidentifiable anime heroes, and others were laid out on large tables. A section dedicated to just tye dye was in the back corner where shoes, jeans, shirts, coats, hats, scarves, even socks had been lined out. Probably the most impressive of all was the vast array of shirts and jeans, which must've been popular here on MCO. There was only a few people in the store, quietly picking out clothes.

Annabelle was the first one to start looking. Where did she go? All the way back to the tye dye, where she hastily grabbed one of the short dresses. Right as her fingers caressed the soft material, a faint glow enveloped the item. Annabelle looked ready to pull away, but something came up on her screen. She paused to read it. "These… these give boosts?"

"All of them do, yes. Some more than others. Some have fire resistance, others give you a higher jump, I think a select few allow brief invisibility." She smiled and tilted her head. "All up to what you like." The others, surprised, looked to me. I waved them off and they started looking around.

"What can I give you in exchange for these?" I asked. "We don't have gold, but we do have a lot of minerals, wood, and other items." Wanda put a finger to her cheek.

"No gold…?" She looked up in thought. "Tell you what. Add me as a friend, and I'll make it free."

"Just a friend invite?" I asked, dubious.

"Yes, yes." She spread her hands, opening up her menu. Then she pivoted it to me, where she showed me her extensive list of friends. Over eight-hundred people already added, and the game had only been up for a week. "Believe it or not, I am more interested in making friends than money. I gather all my materials and make all my clothing in my free time, and I enjoy it. Money doesn't buy happiness, especially in a video game. I prefer to have a long list of friends. It…" She paused. "I guess it keep me updated… lets me know what people are doing. I never leave the city, so being able to hear wonderous stories and be sent marvelous pictures keeps me alive and happy."

"Well, sure." I sent her a friend request and private messaged the others to do the same. When we were all added, her eyes lit up in joy.

"Thank you, Marshmallow." She did a little curtsy and walked away. Her hair seemed to glow from happiness.

Players Marshy, Annabelle, Ruben, Scarlet, and York Received Clothing!

Character Analysis: Wanda

Username: BearBee16

Special Skill: Tailor

Ability: ?

In Party By Self


	9. POLL TIME! I NEED YOUR ANSWERS!

Chapter 9

Hey Readers! It's me, author Mew Ike. I need your advice on what to do with this story. Please give vote on each one of these and either leave a review or send a PM!

**Would you like some romance in MCO?**

No

Marshy x York

Scarlet x Ruben

Annabelle x Ham

Marshy x Steve

** How much like original Minecraft should I make this?**

Keep adding these mods

Too much mods

As much like original minecraft as possible

As little like original minecraft as possible

** What do you think about gore?**

Please no

Please yes

**Foul language?**

I don't mind

No, thank you


	10. Frigid Wastes And Useful Updates!

Chapter 10

THANK YOU FOR ANSWERING THE POLL, RESULTS ARE BEING ADDED TO THIS FAN FICTION RIGHT AWAY.

York tossed a gold coin over in his hand and slapped it onto his palm. When he saw the result, he grunted and tried again. After he received the same result the next time around, he repeated his previous actions. Annabelle, walking by his side, watched with curious eyes.

"You keep getting heads," she pointed out after the tenth or so attempt.

"I know," he mumbled. "These coins either are programmed to land on heads one-hundred percent of the time, or the Legion can screw with the probability of everything. I'm pretty sure it's the second one."

"At least be grateful we got some money from selling all our junk…" Scarlet said softly. She opened her inventory and quickly picked out a stack of muffins. She downed one in a gulp. "The Legion may have trapped us here, but giving us the ability to taste their modded items makes up for it… slightly…."

York made a noise of annoyance and handed the coin to Annabelle. I glanced at him as he returned his hands to his jean pockets and looked to the side. I'm not going to lie, it had been quite the eye opener to see what my group of friends had really looked like. Ruben and Scarlet had dressed just as I had guessed, minus his height difference and the overly amount of cleavage on Scarlet. Ham was no surprise. But York, why had I expected so much different from him?

The six of us had been friends for years. We met each other all in the same Town of Salem game. One laugh led to the next, and boom, soon all six of us were in the same skype group. Years of gaming, laughing, video calls, and emotional bonding led me to believe that I knew these five more than I knew anyone else. But… I'd never think in a thousand years that I'd be standing in front of them, all of them at once, even if it was virtual reality.

I never thought the people I'd met online would still stay loyal when trapped in a situation like this.

"Marshy." York's voice brought me back to reality. He was leaning down, bright blue eyes inches from mine. I hadn't realized it, but I had stopped walking. We were stuck standing in the middle of a busy square, several gamers sending confused glances our way. I blinked at him. "Ah, so you're there."

"Yeah, just zoned out."

"Hm." He raised an eyebrow, questioning. Yet he didn't ask. He led the five of us over to a table where we all sat down. Scarlet handed out the muffins we had bought earlier, and as we munched down on them, York pulled up his map and started mumbling to himself, scribbing across it with his finger.

"These'll come in handy," Ruben said, dropping three magazine-looking books down on the picnic table. "They cost a pretty penny, but it's worth it. The Legion made only a few of these guides to help us with the mods they added, and we're going to need as much information as possible if we want to survive." Annabelle picked up the books one at a time.

"_Each and Every Use of Plastic? Helpful Hints about the Ocean?_ Oh this one will come in handy, _The Greatest Guide to the Underground._"

"That one cost everything we had," I reminded. Scarlet took the book from Annabelle and thumbed through it. "If we keep gathering each and every mineral we come across and selling what we _think_ we won't need, then we'll be fine on cash."

"What about jobs?" Ham questioned. "I wouldn't mind bakin' some pies." He sniffed the air and jabbed a thumb over to a bakery that set red velvet cakes and blueberry pastries in the window.

"We don't have time for jobs," York said, swiveling his map to us. "We're leaving and heading here." The map zoomed in automatically and focused on a particular swampland. Scattered across it in a nearly uniform pattern were tens of X's with different usernames on them.

"Why did so many people die there?" Annabelle asked, a shiver running through her.

"We're going to find out," York insisted. "All those people died on the surface which can only mean there's something valuable below it. The six of us have been playing MineCraft since the alpha release, we are professionals. We're going to figure it out." He narrowed his voice and leaned in. "It's stuff like this that'll lead us right to the Over Dragon, at least I hope."

"Remind me why we're going after that?" Annabelle asked, tracing the lines of the picnic table with her finger.

"Someone has to." The group looked to me. "We promised Oblivion. And like York said, we're professional Minecraft players. If anyone has the tiniest shot of doing anything useful, it's us."

No one said anything to that. Only because we knew it was true.

"It'll take us a while to get there, I recommend leaving now." York stood up. He held a hand out to me. I paused, confused. Then it made sense, he was offering to help me to my feet. I took it and he helped me up, a soft smile on his face. I really expected him to look so much different. I never thought anything when he laughed in the other games we played.

Why was I suddenly smiling, too?

"Which direction?" Scarlet pulled up her map. "North?"

"Yes." York look away from me. I took a breath inwards. Did… did I forget to breathe? "This city should have a northern gate."

After finishing our muffins and clearing the table, we started straight through the center of Legion City to find our way out. The city was getting more and more packed the further we walked in, so much so that the six of us eventually had to hold hands to keep from being separated. Sure, we could see each other on the map and private message each other if we got lost, but I felt like the six of us care too much about each other to risk it. Too dependant on each other. Thankfully, we didn't need to push through the crowd for too long. We reached the northern gate and released hands. Directly in front of us was an expanse of a white, frozen wasteland.

We came to a stop. "This way...?" Scarlet asked softly.

"Yep." York opened his map, paused, then closed it. "Straight north: Endman's Swamp."

"Can you feel temperatures in this game?" Annabelle was answered when a brisk wind picked up and swept past us. Goosebumps blossomed on my arms and a shiver ran up and down my spine.

"Damn Legion," Ruben swore, adjusting his leather jacket.

"This game sucks!" Ham moaned. "1/10 stars."

"Why one?" Annabelle tilted her head at him.

"That one star goes to Microsoft for trying." I rolled my eyes and walked forward. As soon as we left the safety of the gates, the chill really hit us. The breeze was rougher and colder, our breath plumed in the air in front of us, and the soft tingle of inhaling frigid air lined our lungs. The Legion had really opened our eyes to this world. Whatever they had put in us, that tranquilizer with the long name, it was godlike. We wrapped our arms around ourselves.

"The cold won't kill us, will it?" Annabelle asked.

"There's a meter at the bottom of the screen," York pointed out. Sure enough, a light blue bar with the one percent of it filled with dark blue pixels. As we watched, the meter ticked upwards. "Here." He reached into his inventory and pulled out a torch for each of us. When he took it, the meter stopped rising, but it refused to go down. Ruben grunted.

"We'll have to constantly stop to make a fire," he spat. "Goooo, I'm not stopping if I don't have to." He gave me a small push. We continued into the snowy expanse with our torches close and each other closer. Just as much as you could feel the frigid air, you could feel the warm hands of everyone on you.

We walked for a while. An hour? Maybe two? It was hard to tell with no time display or no real idea if MCO days were just as long as Earth days. But I can tell you that it was long, and even longer with the biting air. The whole while I began to realize that it was only getting colder and colder. Our chill meters were dropping rapidly despite how many torches we lit and kept close. And, to our dismay, there was no sign of another biome in sight. No water, no dirt, no sand, just a flat expanse of ice that wielded no landmarks or animals. Eventually we were digging into our food supply, forcing ourselves to eat the simplest of our food to preserve the rest. All of us were huddled together like penguins now, shivering. When I saw our meters were beginning to get full, I stopped.

"We're setting up camp here." No one protested as I created a campfire and set it down. The Annabelle and Ham were the first to start building as the rest of us huddled around the fire, shivering. When we had been warmed, we switched off. We did this three or four times until our crappy 10x10 house was built. We didn't set any furnaces or chests, just a few crafting tables and our beds. It was only around 6pm, judging from the sky. No one complained as the lot of us put our beds in a circle as we always did and curled up under the covers. We set timers in the bottom right corner of our screens to wake a different one of us up every hour to tend for the fire and fell asleep.

MCO Update! MCO Update!

Thank You For Your Time With The Legion! As A Reward For Good Behavior, All Players Have Been Given A Clock, A Distance Tracker, An Expansion On Their Maps, And Several Hundred Gold!

New Features! New Features!

You May Have Noticed, Players, That You Are Beginning To Taste And Feel More Things In This Game! This Is Natural! It Is Because Your Doses of Hyperthalium Are Starting To Become One With Your System! Enjoy Even More Of MCO With These Updates!


	11. Risking One Life For Another

Chapter 11

"Are we about there yet?" Ham complained, holding his torch higher in the air. "I know we've just started, but how far is it? I want to kill something."

"The last thing we need is you to kill anyone," Ruben started, hastily adding, "or anything. We don't know what's going to be out this far. It's much further than our old home, and you know what Oblivion said. Things change the further out you get." He pulled up his clock. "Eight in the morning. Jesus, I never thought I'd ever be up this early."

I tripped and fallen on the ice. The group paused, a few paces ahead. "Tired?" York asked. There was something about the way that he said it that made the burning in my knees cease. I smiled at him.

"Yeah, I guess so." I stood up, but something was caught on my leg. I tugged again, thinking my socks had caught on the ice. It wasn't.

It was the bloody hand of the Legion's leader, Herobrine. He was coming out from under the ice with a smile on his face wide enough to make the Cheshire Cat proud. As he rose, free from his prison, he grabbed onto my other foot. I kicked at him but he refused to release me. His smile only intensified as he held me in place.

"Marshy?"

I turned back to the others. All five of them were suddenly bound by their hands and feet, held in place by five other Herobrines. These Herobrine's were riddles with scars and open wounds. As I watched, the ice below them began to change color. One moment it was white and pure, the next it had turned black and all five of them were dropped down into it, their captors squealing in laughter as they cried out my name over and over. I heard York the most, screaming my name over and over. I was crying and the Herobrines were laughing. I felt Herobrine's warm hands grab my shoulders and squeeze. I cried out this time, tears rushing down my face.

"MARIA!"

The world stopped. Everything was black. Herobrine was gone, the screams had ceased, and my cheeks: they were no longer drenched in tears. I opened my eyes slowly.

I was in the house. The house that we had all built on that snowy wasteland of a biome. There was no Herobrine in sight, there was no one shouting, just York holding me by the shoulders as it appeared he had shaken me awake. He was the only one in the house, the others had to have been outside. The look on his face was worried.

"Marshy, you had a nightmare." He put a hand on my forehead. "Are you alright? Can you hear me?"

"I can hear you." I leaned away from his hand. "Did… you call me Maria?"

"You weren't responding to Marshy," he explained, releasing me and standing up. "I've never had to wake you up before because, well, you don't really fall asleep on your computer. I thought your family would use your real name to get you to come to, so I did the same thing." His shoulders relaxed. "Sorry, I know you hate it, but I was running out of options."

"Right, I don't blame you." I rubbed my face. "How long has everyone been awake?"

"Not that long," he said. "We just started taking the house apart. You didn't show any sign of struggle until everyone else was outside." He looked to his left. "I had a hard time getting up myself, so I'm the only one that noticed you." The wood block to my left vanished and Ham stuck his head through.

"Hey, why ain't you two workin?"

"Just woke up." I stood. "We'll start now." Ham rolled his eyes.

"Sure, ya bunch of slackers." He pulled his head free and started punching away at blocks next to it. Before I turned away to start helping him, I noticed an expression pass over York's face. It was something between concern and regret. He must've been unused to having people see him, because he didn't wipe it away until after I saw it.

The house came down without trouble. Eventually we were back on the road without torches high and our meters low. This time, we were only silent for about five minutes.

"So I know we made that pact back when we were in elementary school," Ham started, "but I think it'd be sorta cool to hear where everyone is from." The pact that we made in elementary school? I remembered that. We were all raised being told that sharing online information was bad, but the six of us had already shared our names. So we promised each other not to share any more info. That included things like facebook or any other real social media. We talked through Skype and Skype alone. No one knew what each other looked like, where they lived, how old they were, or any of the sort. Just names. Scarlet and Ruben exchanged surprised glances. York blinked in surprise. Annabelle raised her hand in the air, waving her torch around.

"Ooo! Ooo! Me first!" She put a hand on her chest and nodded her head. "I'm Annabelle Muller, and I live in Detroit Michigan, USA."

"Pretty sure we all live in the US," Ruben chuckled. Then, raising his torch in the air briefly, he sighed. "I'm Ruben Stende, and I live in Brooklyn, New York." Annabelle applauded him, a wide smile on her face.

"I'm Hamshire Antonio, and I live in Dallas, Texas." He laughed nervously. What? A shy Ham? What in the world was this sorcery?

"Scarlet Rutter," she whispered, "Denver, Colorado." She whipped her hair to the side and started paying attention to her nails. Was that a sign of nervousness as well?

"York McCormick." York ran a hand through his hair. "San Francisco, California."

"W-what?" I asked, looking to him. "You like in San Fran, too?" Ham's sudden nervousness turned to utter amazement.

"Oh my god! You guys both live in the same city and never knew it! What if you were like, best friends in real life or something?" Annabelle laughed.

"That'd be funny, but I think they would've known if they saw each other in person."

"Plus," Scarlet whispered, "San Francisco is a huge city, the chances of finding each other is unbelievably small." The whole while, York was staring at me like he had seen a ghost. I'm sure I looked basically the same.

"What's your last name?" he asked me.

"It's… Yana."

"Yana?"

"Yana," I confirmed. He paused, running the name over in his brain.

"I've… heard it before." Scarlet's eyes widened slightly. Ruben put a hand to his chin in thought. Annabelle and Ham looked to each other, mirroring each other's excitement "But, I can't figure it out. Is your family famous for something?" I paused.

"I don't have a…" York saw the expression on my face and raised a hand.

"Ah, we'll figure it out later." I took a breath outwards at his words. The others hadn't noticed it, but York had. He had opened up a subject that I didn't want to touch with anyone, even my best friends. I didn't have a family.

We walked for a while longer, Annabelle and Ham gushing about each other's houses and cities. Annabelle had just been explaining about her dog Baxter when Ruben came to a stop.

"My meter is going down," he announced. The others came to a halt and checked their own meters.

"You're right." I tapped it with my finger, thinking it had bugged. It ticked two bars down in response. "Wow, it's going down fast."

"It's getting a little much to hold these torches," Annabelle agreed, putting hers away. The other's followed suit. "I'm… getting hot."

"Me, too." Scarlet replied softly, tugging at the rim of her jeans.

"You don't think we got so cold we're hallucinating this heat right, York?" Ruben glanced his way. "York?" The tall Californian was stuck in place without a menu to stare at, eyes wide. Something in those blue depths frightened me. Something that told me something was terribly wrong. Then, with a scream, York jumped in my direction and pushed me to the ground.

"GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

One moment I was flying through the air, York above me, the next he was being grabbed and thrust into the air by a black, crispy hand that rose from the ice where I had been standing. The others, so shocked by the display that that they nearly dropped their weapons as they fumbled for them out of the inventories, took action. Ham was the first, stabbing two amethyst blades into the arm of the hand, drawing dark black blood that splattered on the ice.

Ruben cursed. "You idiot! Get York down first!" Ham looked to him, eyes frantic. Then, without really thinking, the young boy pulled his swords free. The ground quaked as the hand showed wordless signs of stress, shaking York in his fist. I heard York scream, but it wasn't the type of "GET ME DOWN I'M SCARED OF HEIGHTS!" scream. It was a scream that he was in pain. And I could see why. Ham's blades were melting. My heat meter was rising.

This hand was basically a hand that had risen out of hot, fiery hell.

"Scarlet, ice on York, now!" I shouted.

"On it!" she shouted, standing straight and pointing all her fingers up at the hand. A mist of thick snow started streaming from her fingers. The cloud rose until it surrounded him, harmless to the hand. York's screams turned into gasps. If the hand couldn't burn him, it would sure as hell squeeze him.

Annabelle grabbed a stack of dirt and started stacking her way up the arm. Sensing this, the hand swept through the center of the stack when she was about a quarter of the way up. She landed, a little heavy on her feet, but the damage was hardly noticeable. I pulled out a stack of dirt and did the same, but I was much quicker than Annabelle. I could stack and jump in twos at a time. By the time the hand had turned away from Ham and Ruben distracting it, I was already jumping on from my stack and onto the hand. It darted to the left, expecting me to miss the grab and land on my stomach. Instead I grabbed onto it and stabbed a knife into the side of the palm. My heat meter started rising out of control as the black blood started seeping into my clothes and my skin. I felt it burning away at my flesh, the pain almost uncontrollable. There was a part of me that wanted to release and land on the ice to be cooled, but I felt it.

I felt York's hand reach for mine and take a strong hold of it. His eyes met mine. He was calm, completely calm now. I could see blisters and burns blossoming around the places where the hand was keeping him prisoner. Regardless of the mist around us, it was still hot. But even if it was hot and we were burning, did he think we were going to die? Is that why he was calm?

"Quit it," I snapped, squeezing his hand. "We're not going anywhere." He blinked at me as if he had been suddenly woken up. He opened his mouth to say something, but I looked away. Using my burning hands and the knife, I stabbed my way all the way up until I was basically lying on top of York, the fingers separating us. I took that knife and cut off the pinky with little difficulty, watching with satisfaction as it dropped to the ice and vanished in a plume of poorly animated pixel dust. I did the same with the ring finger until the hand started shaking back and forth quickly. I was thrown into the air briefly before York pulled me back. I forgot that he had never let go of me, and even though he could've taken out his own knife and freed him, he was choosing to keep me in place with it. "Th-thank you." He smiled briefly.

"We're going to cut it down!" I heard Ruben call. "Prepare yourselves!"

"Alright, alright!" I called back, cutting off the middle finger. Now the hand only kept York in place by the chest, thumb pressed painfully against his sternum. I slipped the knife under it and tugged upwards. The hand pushed upwards then back down and the knife came right up through both fingers. I didn't stop the pull against it when they had been severed and found the knife flying right up towards my face. I leaned to the right and watched as it soared past me. At the same time, Annabelle cut the remainder of the arm and my sudden lean to the right sent it flying that direction. York and I were falling right towards them. Ham, Ruben, and Annabelle moved out of the way right as Scarlet dropped a truck full of white, fluffy snow in our path. We hit it right after the hand dusted, leaving the snow greyish and mildly warm. After a few seconds, that heat vanished into sweet, sweet cold.

"York! Marshy!" Annabelle ran up to us and cleared away the snow. York was on one side of it, I was on the other, our hands joined. She paused when she unearthed this, surprised. "You… guys?" I sat up slowly, oblivious to her. When I felt York's hand go limp, everything came rushing back. Suddenly I was over him, both hands on his shoulders.

"York." My words didn't reach him. "York. York!" I shook him. "York, you better wake up!"

"Marshy, Marshy." Ruben took ahold of my arm. "Breathe. Look." He gestured to a pixelated sign above York's head. It read in big red letters 'UNCONSCIOUS.' "It'd let us know if he had died. Plus." He pointed at his health bar. Two red hearts left, both pulsing strongly. As I watched, his third heart started filling.

I put a hand on my chest. The swell of tears had been gathering behind my eyes ever since he had been grabbed by that hand, but now it was receding. My heart was visibly beating. It was so loud the others were looking my way like an attack was on its way.

"We have to leave immediately," I told them. "If there's one of those here, there's most likely others." I grabbed York and held him up princess style in my hands. Thank God this game hadn't incorporated weight in it, or else I might've been in trouble. This guy was over six foot, after all. The others watched with raised eyebrows as I turned from them and started back on the path. They did a little jog to keep up. The whole while we crossed the wasteland to the instant we all saw the swamp approaching, none of us talked. And that's alright, because I wouldn't have been able to respond.

York had given himself up for me. I wasn't ok with that. I wasn't ok with this game. And I sure as hell wasn't ok with the fact that he would've died if we had been any slower. As I held him in my arms and listened to his soft breathing, I began to realize that this was serious. People died in this game, died in real life. This wasn't fun and games anymore. Maybe the Legion was granting that wish the six of us had wanted years back: a Minecraft game that was harder than what they had given us. I squeezed my fingers softly.

I didn't have a family. I had the five players by my side right then and there.

And one of them had nearly died for me.

Enemy Analysis: Charred Limb

Frequency Of Spawn: Uncommon/Rare

Level Of Difficulty: 2/10

Biome: Ice Flats

Experience Gained From Kill: One Level.

Drops: Charred Fingers.


	12. Ice Mist And Burn Heals

Chapter 12

We all agreed it'd be best to make the base out of stone. We had just entered Endman's Swamp and already we were seeing the red X's on our map that showed where the players who had been here previously had died. There was only one of these marks within sight in our rendering distance, and none of us had the energy to approach it. At least not yet. York was still unconscious and the base had yet to be completed. If we wanted to take on whatever had killed all these players, then we had to make sure we had a strong base to run back to in case things got sticky. So we set York in a bed and worked around him. With five hands on the job, the house came together in a beautiful flourish. Stone walls two blocks thick, stone gates eight tall, a floors and ceiling layered by four blocks, we were set for a while.

"What's the plan?" Ruben asked, hopping down from the lowest point of the roof right in front of me. "You're not thinking of keeping all of us here when there's daylight to burn, right?"

"Of course not." I opened my inventory and grabbed my sword. "Annabelle and I are going out food gathering. Ham and Scarlet are going out resource gathering. Ruben, stay with York. We're all taking on the caves tomorrow."

"Right," they said in unison. Scarlet and Ham took off one direction, Annabelle and I in the other. Ruben waved the four of us off and closed the iron door behind him as he started inside the base. The sound of furnaces cooking and chests being filled was faint from inside.

Endman's swamp was just like any normal swamp. Water was found here and there speckled with lilypads, dark oak trees covered in vines and damp leaves grew in uniform patterns, and the occasional mob that kept to the shade watched angrily as we either ignored them or attacked them from afar. Using her pearl bow, Annabelle managed to take them out as I chopped down trees and collected vines. Bones, flesh, and gunpowder now aplenty, she struck up a conversation.

"That was scary, what happened back there." She ended the life of a nearby creeper in one hit, smiling faintly as it fell over and pixelated into nothing. That smile vanished when she saw I didn't have an intention to respond. She parted her rainbow hair to the other side, careful to keep it out of her eyes. The tye dye dress she had picked from Wanda's shop glowed faintly. Unlike the others, whenever she initiated combat with a mob she gained a brief speed boost. I doubt she bought it for that reason. "Are you hurt at all, Marshy? Your health bar isn't regenerating anymore."

I glanced at it. I was two hearts under full. Blast, that must've been because of my burns from getting splattered by that things blood. I carefully pulled down my shirt from the collar. Sure enough, pixelated blisters were formed in small groups across my collar bones and sternum. I hadn't even noticed the pain until now. Adrenaline does crazy things to a person, I guessed. Grunting in frustration, I pulled out a golden apple and chomped down on it. The blisters subsided and my health gained half a heart. Still not enough to make the pain go away completely, but it was better than nothing. And I wasn't going to waste golden apples on petty burns.

"Behind you." Annabelle fired a bolt at a zombie that had been walking in my direction. It fell to the ground and I picked up rotten flesh and a potato. I rubbed my face. Now I couldn't even pay attention to my surroundings. What had the previous fight done to me?

"Thank you," I said, heaving my sword over my shoulder. "What else should we gather? Water?"

"Are you alright?" she asked back. "Marshy, it's ok to be worried about York and everyone. This game obviously isn't for the faint hearted." There was a moment of silence.

"I worried about all of you before this," I told her honestly. "Now I have a reason."

"Why would you worry about us?" She tilted her head and smiled. "We're pretty darn tough, you know? There's been some tight situations before, too."

"Not like this." I cut the head off of a creeper that started to hiss at me. I grabbed the gunpowder before it hit the ground and checked how much I had in my inventory. Bah, barely enough to make five TNT, and that was counting all the creepers we had killed back in the jungle. "We can't die in this game. We just can't take any chances. Especially what York did back there."

"You mean how he pushed you out of the way?" I nodded at her. "Well, when confronted with any situation like that, any of us would risk our lives for the other." A sad smile appeared on her face. "I think York knew what he was doing. He's never acted on impulse, has he?" No, he hasn't. But I knew that what had happened with the hand had been nothing but impulse. I could've found my way out of the hand, I could've cut myself free and told the others what I needed them to do. York: he had no idea what to do in that situation. He had done it just to keep me from the pain.

Even he knew that.

Annabelle was suddenly in front of me. God, why was she taller than me? I couldn't get the image I had created of her out of my head when we first met. Now that she was standing right in front of me in the flesh, I was beginning to wonder if it really was her. No, what was I thinking? This was Annabelle. Her user name, her voice, her personality, it was all her. I relaxed my shoulders as she, yet again, smiled at me.

"You don't need to worry about us as much as you have been, Marshy," she insisted. "The lot of us are pretty good at this game. We got this." She gave me a hug. A real hug. Like, I felt the warmth of her body against mine. Her arms, her clothes, her breath. She was on the other side of the country and yet she was here. It frightened me. What else could the Legion do when we were all trapped so deeply in this game that we could feel things like this? "Let's grab a couple buckets of water and get back to them." She pulled away. I hadn't hugged her back, but she understood. She somehow knew that I couldn't do that. Not yet.

"Thank you, Annabelle," I whispered. She laughed softly.

"Of course, Marshy."

NOTIFICATION FROM OBLIVION SCROLLS! The beeping sound nearly startled me. Annabelle flinched and opened her menu, though the Japanese gamer had only sent it to me. Upon opening it via my screen, his face appeared in the form of a video call. He blinked, eyes adjusting. Then, relief spread across his expression.

"Thank goodness," he started, "you're alive."

"Why wouldn't I be?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"You're in Endman's Swamp. What the hell are the six of you thinking, going there?" I opened my mouth to speak, but he held up a hand. "Nevermind, I know you're probably there investigating the Over Dragon. That doesn't make the four of us any less concerned. What have you found?"

"Nothing," I replied. "We were attacked by a hot hand of some sort back in the ice flats."

"A charred limb, eh?" Okawa smoothed out his right eyebrow. "In the ice flats… what a rare spawn. I was wondering why the sudden item drop." He held out his hand, palm to the sky. In it appeared a smaller, cuter version of the pinky finger I had chopped off the mob. "You must have one of these in your inventory, too. Am I right?" He was. I quietly pulled it out and showed him the index finger I had gathered. "Perfect! I'll send it over immediately!"

"What does it do?" Annabelle asked, poking her head into sight. Okawa pointed the item at her before placing it in his trade window.

"It has several purposes, one of which involves crafting. Two is enough to make six experience chewables, which is why I'm sending it to you." I accepted the trade and took the pinky finger from him. "Just throw the both of them in a crafting table. You'll get what you need. Hope you like spicy food."

"Won't you need experience?" I asked.

"Not as much as the six of you." He opened his window. "Ah, Anime Eyes! It looks like you'll learn your ability after this!"

"I will?" She opened her own inventory. Scarlet had learned her ability at level two, but Annabelle was level six and showed no sign of it. "How can you tell?"

"Our experience bars start out green, right? Well, the closer you get to learning your new ability or leveling it up, the redder it turns. Look, yours is almost blood red, and you're about level seven. Prepare to learn it."

"How do you know all this, Oblivion?" I asked.

"Okawa," he corrected gingerly. "I see you and I as equals."

"Right, right," I dismissed. "How do you know all of this? All this about the game?"

"Guides." He opened the trade window once more and filled it to the brim with guidebooks, which I hastily accepted. "Read up. You need to know everything if you want to survive. And here, some burn potions for anyone caught up with the charred limb." Now that my inventory was full, Okawa smiled. "The boys and I will be exploring the further north. If you want us to wait for you, let us know. Right now we're on the trail of a big discovery. Can't tell you in person, because…" He put his hand on his forehead, forming an L with his fingers. I thought he was calling me a loser until I realized it stood for the Legion. "Good luck to you, Marshy. Keep up updated on what you find!" His face blinked out of existence.

We returned to camp a few minutes later. Ham and Scarlet had already returned and we sitting out front of the grass. While Scarlet meditated, Ham was planting some potatoes he must've gotten from a few zombies. I thought we were silent upon approaching, but she opened her eyes upon us getting close enough.

"It worked…" she said, a dastardly grin creeping up her face. "You didn't even feel it." I opened the iron gate to the makeshift garden.

"Feel what?"

"The mist." She held her hand out in front of her, palm to the sky. In it, a small ball of mist had formed. "I placed mist all around the house… and I can sense whenever something walks through it…. Talk about a solid defense."

"Close your eyes." Scarlet didn't even need to be told twice at Annabelle's words. The anime lover held up seven fingers behind her back. "How many-?"

"Seven." Scarlet opened her eyes. "I can basically see in the dark." Her smile was wicked, almost evil.

"How's York?" I asked.

"He regain consciousness earlier," Ham answered, pressing the last of the potatoes into the dirt. "Ate some food and fell back asleep."

"We're not going to be able to check out the site anytime soon, are we?" Annabelle whispered. Scarlet scanned my expression, waiting for a response as well. Ham sat down next to her. He hadn't heard what Annabelle had said but he sure as hell acted like he did.

"We'll leave when we're ready," I replied, walking past them and opening the front door. "Keep yourselves busy. I'll work on the plan." I stepped inside and shut it behind me.

"Oh, you're back." Ruben walked out of the back room room and into sight. "York needs some burn heals, if we can craft any."

"I got some from Okawa." I pulled it from my inventory and showed him the entire stack I had been given. "He in here?"

"Yeah." He opened the door to the back room and led me inside. "York, man. Marshy's here." There wasn't much of a response, just the shuffling as he turned over in his bed. Ruben placed a torch on the wall and right away I saw that York hadn't just put himself in pain.

He had nearly died.

His right eye and that half of his face was covered by painful blisters and burns. His shirt, having to be cut off by Ruben and thrown in the corner, was charred beyond repair. His bare chest was riddled with burned stripes, shadowing where the charred limbs' fingers had kept him in place. Scarlet had been here already, because there was a bucket of ice in the corner that was half full. As I entered, York covered his face with his hands, sighing. It was unusual enough to see him without his shirt on, but to see him in such terrible condition with open wounds and a mangled face. His bed had been placed against the wall, where a bunch of pillows had been placed for him to lean against. He slunk back onto the covers, refusing to look at us.

"I have some burn potions," I said, shaking the bottle so he could hear it bubble. He paused, then looked through his fingers with his one good eye at me.

"How did you get those?" His voice was raspy.

"Okawa gave us a stack."

"And you haven't used any on yourself yet?" I wasn't sure if he was joking or serious, so I opened the current bottle I had and slapped it on my upper chest. The blisters I had vanished into thin air, leaving nothing but flawless skin behind. Upon seeing this, York sat up completely. I could see his burned eye fully now, and it wasn't pretty. He held out his burned hand. I poured some of the solution on my hand and applied it to that instead of handing it to him. He waited patiently for me to finish before I handed him a new bottle. This time he poured the entire content of the bottle on his eye, forcing it open with his free hand. When it had soaked enough, he faced me and his entire face was back to normal. The look of relief on his face then was nothing compared to when he poured yet another bottle on his midsection. His entire body was suddenly back to the way it had been before. He stood up and shook his hands, clearing away any of the excess potion. He sighed.

"Thank you, Marshy." He looked pitifully at the shirt in the corner. "I guess I should've gone for a shirt that offered fire resistance."

"It's a good thing you bought two then." Ruben tossed him the other shirt York had purchased at Wanda's. This one wasn't green like his last, but bright red. York sighed at the sight of it.

"There's no such thing as showers or baths anywhere near here, huh?"

"Annabelle and I gathered a few buckets of water," I pointed out. "If you close yourself up behind a wood door or something, Ruben can pour it through a hole in the roof." York glanced at him. Ruben rolled his eyes jokingly and took a bucket from me. When he left he room to go out and climb the roof, I went to follow. Before I went to close the door, I turned back to him. He was looking at me. "Thank you," I said. He blinked.

"For?"

"Saving me." I looked to the side. "I'm not sure why you would sacrifice yourself, though. I could've handled fine."

"We need a leader. You know better than I do that you're the only one who can fill that job. If you'd-"

"I don't want anyone dying for me, York." The voice I normally used when talking turned sour. He stopped talking and blinked in surprise at me. He did that a lot, was it a normal thing for him? Suddenly I realized what I was doing. I was getting angry. Angry at someone who had saved my life. I sighed, shifted weight to one leg, and met his eyes. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you." He chuckled.

"To be honest, I don't blame you. I came pretty close to dying there. I don't know how I'd feel leaving you guys behind, let alone how you guys would feel if I left." I started to say something, but Ruben came running into the room.

"You have to see this." He left the room with the two of us on his heels. When we were outside, there wasn't much to see. Just Ham and Annabelle standing next to Scarlet, who was still sitting criss-crossed on the lawn. She held up her hand as we exited, a signal to stop. All five of us came to a halt immediately. I already knew what she was doing: using her ice mist to try and find things in the air. I could tell she was focusing hard because the air was suddenly cold and quiet. I could almost see the air around us shifting. Maybe it was us breathing, maybe it was her working her magic, maybe it was something else.

"Weapons," Scarlet whispered, almost so softly I couldn't hear her. "Quickly." All of us grabbed for our weapons. As soon as they were drawn, something appeared in our rendering distance. Something large and frightening. It wasn't coming towards us but instead stepped within our range of view by accident, then quickly stepped back out. I thought as first a boulder had rolled in and out by accident, scaring Scarlet. Then I heard the sound of screaming coming from within our headset, indicating someone was nearby and in need of help. Scarlet stood. "We found the beast of Endman's Swamp."

Character Analysis: Okawa.

Username: Oblivion Scrolls.

Special Skill: Hardcore Mode Expert.

Ability: Probability Manipulator.

Guild: Oblivion Unicorns.

In Party With Three Others.

Bonus Information: Lives In Tokyo, Japan.


	13. Annabelle's Ability Is Off Setting

Chapter 13

I'd fought my fair share of minecraft mobs before. Withers, Ender Dragons, Elder Guardians, and the various other bosses that had been added over the years. I'd seen the Charred Hand and a handful of unusual mobs like creeper skeletons and zombie creepers. But nothing compared to the ferocity of the Endman. He was about the size of the base we had recently constructed. His eyes were emerald green and his teeth, sharpened to a deadly point, reflected the same color in brilliant, prismatic hues. Besides the tiny, uselss arms and scrawny legs that could barely support a chihuahua, this creature was nothing but a giant rock. Know the Pokemon Golem? Yeah, it was basically him. Except he didn't have a head, his whole body was basically his head. Where there wasn't rock falling off and respawning on him there were vines and bits of swampy grass desperately clinging on. He couldn't move much on his limbs so the brute was rolling around with them tucked to his body.

Now that we were within aggro distance of him, everything else spawned around him. His name, highlighted in brilliant green letters above his head, had two health bars beneath. The first bar had been knocked down two-thirds of the way, barely orange to the eye. Two young players with blonde and brown hair were jumping left and right, flawlessly avoiding his attacks. Though their health was nearly full they were obviously not doing much damage. Plus the two of them were exhausted, which said something when you played a game that did not require any physical movements.

The Endman turned to us, emerald eyes gleaming dangerously. It charged, a war cry that sounded more like a burp escaping his mouth. The six of us scattered in different directions, weapons ready. When the beast went for Scarlet first, she held her palm out to him like she expected him to stop. That's when a beam of ice shot from her and landed right in his left eye, splattering pixelated brown blood. His first health bar vanished in an instant. He rolled away and retreated under one of the taller willow trees to pull it free.

"That much health gone in one hit?" Ruben asked, glancing at the two players that had each dropped to a knee. The blonde boy lifted his head from the ground and glared at him.

"You idiots! If you take away too much health at once, he-" The Endman roared in interruption. This time, he didn't make that gross burping sound. His voice was suddenly deep, rumbling, and loud. He backed onto his two hind legs and suddenly, he wasn't the dopey ball with four limbs. His pixels rearranged and he basically evolved from a the Pokemon Golem to a crazy brother of the Thing from the Fantastic Four. He swept Scarlet aside while she gawked in surprise, knocking her from the ground and into lilypad infested water, which she quickly surfaced, annoyed.

"Take out the arms," the brown-haired player told me. She looked to be about twelve years old give or take. It was hard to take her seriously when she had applied an almost unsanitary amount of makeup to her face. She looked like one of those extremely girly clowns you'd see at a child's birthday party. "Then the feet. Then the core."

"Have you battled him before?" I asked. She shook her head.

"Only heard rumors," she said, her over applied lipstick smearing her teeth. "No one has been able to beat him yet." The Endman roared and turned towards us. Young Miss Makeup straightened and pulled out her sword, eyes ablaze with the thrill of battle. When he charged she did the same. Her dove, pushing on his back legs in an attempt to grab her. He neared and she sidestepped just in time to slash his stone arm from the shoulder to the tip of the rocky thumb. Brown, muddy blood seeped from the wound in a stream that refused to stop yet alone slow. He turned to her and roared, emerald eyes slowly fading orange.

"Too much damage!" her friend scolded. The blonde preteen shook his fist at her. "He's getting angry too quickly!"

"We can't sit here and fight for hours," Annabelle shouted. When the beast charged for Ruben and Ham, the two of them split, watched as the beast struggled to slow after the miss, and slashed at them with swords of their own. His final health bar hit the midpoint and suddenly his eyes were large and red. Several of his teeth popped free and dropped onto the dirt, giving the remainder room to grow and turn jagged. Now unable to close his mouth over his large overbite, the Endman was unable to roar. He dropped to all fours, jagged body tense.

"Marshy," York called from the other side of the field. "Do you have that gunpowder?"

At the very word 'gunpowder' my heart started to race. "Yes," I replied, a wide smile growing on my face. "I do. Does anyone else?" I heard the beep as everyone's inventories clicked open. One trade request after the next appeared on my screen. After accepting them all, I suddenly had the ingredients needed to make almost a full stack of dynamite. After creating them, I split the stack in two and held them in both hands. My five team members stepped back. The two randoms looked to them, to me, than each other. They thought best to step back as well.

"Go easy on the TNT," Scarlet reminded softly. "You don't want to blast him into the next dimension." I didn't reply. I locked eyes with the Endman, who seemed to be aware that the majority of his opponents had fled. He turned to me, red eyes focusing. I quietly placed a redstone torch in my inventory. Our gazes did not shift.

"She's gettin' in her mode!" Ham punched the air and jumped up and down. "Give it to 'em!"

"She knows this game is a lot different than the others, right?" Annabelle whispered to Ruben, who scoffed.

"She knows her limits," York assured. "It's keeping her from going all-out that's the problem."

As soon as he finished talking, the beast charged. His maw opened and I found my first target. After scratching the redstone torch across two TNT's in my hand, I chucked them between his teeth and right down his throat. Even the inside of his wet mouth couldn't douse it as both blocks of dynamite ignited and blew his health down to a fourth. He skidded to a stop directly in front of me, eyes wide in surprise. I pulled out two more blocks of dynamite and held them out to him, challenge in my eyes. He scuttled backwards and stopped only when a tree blocked his path. I saw him looking around the clearing for another foe, assured I would like to be relieved of him. As soon as his eyes caught sight of York I was in front of him, shoving two more blocks of ignited dynamite down his throat. He tried to spit these up but I stabbed my sword through both of his lips, keeping them sealed. Ready to ignite, I darted backwards, watching as the Endman scrambled to pull the sword from his lips. It was no use. When His body had turned too bulky, he couldn't bring his hands to his face. The TNT exploded. His health was minimized to a single point.

"WATCH OUT!" the two players called to me. Not a second to waste, then. I charged him, one last cube of dynamite in my hands. The Endman began to shift. His body grew in size, his teeth were sharpening, and his health was slowly beginning to regenerate. When I got close he swiped at me using a stone paw that had almost tripled in size. His muscles were still too large to remove the sword from his lips, but that didn't seem to bother him anymore. He was intent on trying to grab me as I hopped from one spot to the air, feeling the sweaty rocks of his palm as I came close to being caught. Even as his health crawled by to regenerate, his body armor grew thicker and harder, and the places I could throw dynamite grew to zero, I knew It couldn't panic. I had my own way of getting to him.

I grabbed the sword in his lips and tore it free, taking the entire outline of his lips with me. His health was back to 1 HP once more, but it was still gaining. His mouth was open, but I had yet to find an entrance. His teeth had grown so large and jagged that there was no longer a way past them, no longer any space to fit anything explosion worthy.

While I sat there thinking, I missed that Annabelle had stepped onto the field. "I'm trying my ability," she told me without looking back. "Maybe I can help you." Enraged, the Endman started towards her, rocky fists clawing at the ground to give himself speed. Annabelle adjusted her stance, placed two fists out in front of her, and took a breath inwards. Before she could exhale, two bullet-looking bolts of energy shot from her knuckles. Unprepared, Annabelle swung her fists away. The bolt from her right fist hit the ground directly in front of the Endman, the other hit the nearby trunk of a tree. These bolts hit and spread on the surface they landed, morphing into a poorly drawn outline of a circle. These outlines shifted slightly, rippling almost like the surface of a calm lake. Both of them were pulsing through the rainbow of colors, none of which they shared at the same time.

The Endman took one step onto Annabelle's creation and vanished. One moment he was stepping onto it, ready to knock down my teammate without a single rueful thought. The next, he was gone. Just gone. Until two seconds later where he came tumbling out of the ring on the tree. Completely disoriented, the Endman rolled and stumbled across the field. The two players from before jumped out of the way, barely avoiding injury as he swept past and knocked down a half dozen trees in his wake. While he fumbled to stop, I realized that Annabelle had gone completely still.

"I…" she whispered, "I control portals."

Ability Analysis: Ice Manipulation.

User: Scarlet/Sacred Goddess.

Ability Level: 3.

Current Uses: Mist Locator, Burn Heal, Block Creator, Shard Shooter.

Rank Out Of Living Players (The Lower, The Better): 7,094,842 Of 35,238,451.


	14. Ender Bending the Rules!

Chapter 14

Annabelle's spine straightened. Her fists clenched at her sides, trembling. Something about her had changed. The animal-loving, farm-handy, and creative-mode master had suddenly changed.

"Annabelle," I started, reaching a hand out to her. Too late, she stepped away from me only to turn back and smile. Her eyes were different. Instead of softness there was a hunger for thrill.

"I have an idea." She clapped her hands together. "Get the TNT ready." She aimed her right fist at the beast. Another bolt of black energy escaped her, hitting him dead in the chest. The Endman wasn't even blown back. He continued to sit up and proceed to his feet. Though he was clumsy he was upright quickly. His eyes went to his chest, confused. "The TNT," she reminded. Before I could question her, she started walking towards the Endman. Walking. There was no aggressive air about her, just the calm collectiveness of a young girl. Her opponent targeted her as she approached. He charged her once more, his mouth still under the protection of his jagged teeth. His chest still had the rainbow outline to it, but both the portals that had been placed before had vanished. As he approached, I saw she wasn't going to attack it.

She was luring him.

"Light it," she whispered. I glanced from her to the beast, then back again. I trusted her, but as I scraped the redstone across the dynamite, I felt a tinge of worry.

He charged, the ground quaking and throwing up blocks behind him. Annabelle paused when he was within a reasonable distance. The Endman grabbed the ground with his giant fists and, with one powerful tug forward, launched himself at Annabelle. She stepped out of the way an instant before he could've potentially struck her. From my angle I couldn't clearly see where she had landed because he masked her, but suddenly, I understood what she had done.

"NOW!" Annabelle shouted. An instant later, I could see her. I met eyes with her through the gaping hole in the Endman's chest she had created. One portal on his chest, one portal on his back. He had a gaping tunnel running right through him. And now, as my TNT soared through the air and directly through the beast, I saw the final expression of realization run across his face. The dynamite exploded in his center. His HP hit zero before he had a chance to fully disintegrate. When the rocks, dirt, and mud took to the air in a shower of broken bits, the game paused. Everything around me froze like we had been trapped by a paralysis spell.

CONGRATULATIONS!

BOSS DEFEATED: ENDMAN SWAMPET.

The game unpaused itself. The remains of the Endman pixelated away into nothing. I heard an unfamiliar beep go off from my own end. My inventory opened itself and revealed several new items. A bottle of leveling, several thousand coins, an 'I Beat The Swamp Beast!' shirt, and the rares of them all, an ultra-rare drop known as the Ender Bender. This weapon, a whip with a bladed metal line, had been dyed a variety of different purples. I thought the line would be stiff and hard because of the blade, but it dangled and acted almost like a ribbon. Talk about unique. When I pulled it out, the others looked to me with surprised expressions.

"How did you get that?" the two players asked in unison. There was no sign that they cared to have spoken at the same time; it must've been a common occurence.

"I didn't get anything besides the shirt," Annabelle said sadly, pulling it out. "It's not even… it's ugly."

"That's not the point," the female player said, approaching me. "How many bosses have you completed? Five? Ten?"

"This is my first one," I said, taking a step back. She was so close to my face I could nearly guess the brand of her toothpaste. "Besides the charred hand-"

"That's not a boss!" she blurted. A trade request appeared in my window. Ten million coins dropped into the offer box.

"Wait, ten million?" I stammered.

"That's how much it's worth." She tapped the screen. "Hurry up."

"I don't want to give it away," I admitted, placing it back in my hotbar. "No sale, I'm sorry." She looked appalled. Oh no. Don't tell me this was one of those kids that always got what they wanted, regardless of what it was? She looked pretty young, I think that was the case. "Look, I'm sorry. But I don't have a good weapon of my own yet and-"

She struck me. Backhanded me with her manicured fingernails so hard that one of them broke at the tips. I fell to the ground and suddenly she was too. Not from the force of the slap, but something else. A red window had opened on her screen first, then on all of ours. The sound of an alarm sounded from all around us.

OFFENDER IN YOUR AREA!

OFFENDER IN YOUR AREA!

USERNAME: PrettyXGurlX69!

OFFENDER ATTACKED ANOTHER PLAYER WITHOUT ENABLING PVP!

ALL PLAYERS SEEN TRAVELING, ASSISTING, OR FRIENDING OFFENDERS WILL BE AUTOMATICALLY PUNISHED!

OFFENDER PrettyXGurlX69, YOU ARE HEREBY CONDEMNED AS AN OFFENDER FOR 3 DAYS, OR UNTIL BROUGHT IN TO SERVE TIME AND PUNISHMENT!

Pretty Gurl's name flashed brilliant red above her. A red beacon shot to the sky, illuminating the pixelated clouds briefly. When it came to a stop, Pretty Gurl's body was glowing a dangerous red, flashing like the lights on a police vehicle. She looked down at her hands, eyes wide. Then those eyes went to me, at her name, then lastly to her partner. The two of them didn't even need to think. They turned around and fled the scene, hastily closing the trade window. Within the course of a minute, the both of them had vanished out of our rendering distance.

Scarlet stepped up to my side and helped me to my feet. "Huh, the Legion punishes other players for attacking others? Doesn't make much sense when you get right down to it, but I guess they have at least some sense of justice." I took a deep breath. The adrenaline had no yet left my system. Goosebumps ran up and down my arms. The hair on the back on my neck was standing on edge. My heart, still beating furiously, was stuck in my throat. As I swallowed and shook myself off the thrill of battle dimmed. I wasn't off put by Pretty Gurl's strike. It hadn't hurt that bad. I had fallen to the ground in sheer surprise.

I pulled out the Ender Bender. Was this weapon really worth that much to her? That not being able to get it would back her into a corner like that? I checked the stats on the weapon, but there was none. No speed, no damage per second, just the words BASED ON PLAYER SKILL highlighted in green. It seemed like a powerful weapon, but if it was based off player skill, I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to use it properly. No way to tell but try, I assumed.

"Guys," Ruben called. "You better have a look at this." We approached him. He was standing where the Endman had been blown to bits, but instead of leaving a crater in his wake, there was a single trap door. The iron door had been opened partially, enough to slide a few fingers under, which Ruben proceeded to do. The door gave through and creaked open with loud protest. As soon as it was upright the hinges snapped and the door pixelated into oblivion. It left behind a dark, dark tunnel directly downwards. The wooden rungs of the ladder were old and strained under Ruben's testing foot.

"Awesome!" Ham shouted, pushing past him and starting down. "Last one there has to make dinner!"

"No, no, no, no!" Scarlet grabbed him by the ear and tugged him out of the hole. He gave in to her and let himself be thrown down on the grass. "We can't just go in there blindly. We have to think of a plan, go back and get materials."

"Right, a plan." York placed his fist in his palm, eyes lost in thought. He looked to the others. "Pack up everything from the house. Everything. Leave the house itself, we won't have time to take it apart before everyone gets here."

"Everyone…?" Annabelle asked.

"The Endman was a well-known boss in this area and nearby towns. Now that he's been defeated, people will come flooding here. They'll be curious to see what he was guarding, and we found it." He pointed at the tunnel. "Players are punished for certain crimes in this game. That means there's a chance people can steal from chests. We don't have time to hide the stuff, just grab all of it. We'll probably be walking a long way away, anyway." He looked to me. "You guard the entrance, we'll be back with the stuff."

"Why Marshy?" Ham asked, sticking out his lower lip in protest. "Why can't I stay?"

"_You_ can't because you'll just leave without us," York answered. "And Marshy is obviously the strongest of the lot of us right now, dynamite and that whip included. If anyone can keep away anything, it's Marshy." I found myself blushing.

"Thank you." My voice was quiet, I didn't trust myself not to stutter. Without being told twice, the others fell into line behind him. I stayed back and watched them go. When they had exited my sight, I dropped to all fours and crawled over to the tunnel. I couldn't tell how deep it was, the sun was at too wrong of an angle to light it up without casting heavy shadows down it. I could feel the cold air of the mines waft up over my face as I leaned in closer. The smell of damp rock filled my nostrils. My senses were picking up this game better and better every day. Where did this game end and I began?

I reached down and grabbed one of the ladder rungs. It felt rough and dusty to the touch. It made a quiet squeal when I squeezed it. Looking further down, it didn't look like they got much better. If I could make out anything from my angle, it was the dust that was slowly being pushed upwards by an almost still gust of air. Then, the dust paused. After a ten second or so pause, the particles would be pulled back in by another unusually slow current of air, only to repeat the pattern.

This cave… was it breathing?

"The Over Dragon isn't down there, if that's what you're thinking." This voice startled me. I spun around and pulled out my whip, a curt squeal escaping me. In all the sudden commotion, my I placed my hand down where I thought there would be dirt and nearly tumbled straight down the tunnel head first. If it wasn't for my quick thinking (which involved me twisting my body at an odd angle to grab the nearest rung), I would've probably dropped all the way down. I climbed the ladder quickly and confronted the man who had spoken, ready for combat if he intended to go down first.

It was Steve.

The guy I had seen on the first day.

The one that had nearly killed me.

"Calm," he said, lowering his hands slowly. He followed them to the ground, where he sat criss-cross. "I'm not here to hurt you. Sorry, I'm not very good at announcing myself." He blinked his purple eyes and the name above his head pixelated slightly. It still read STEVE in green letters. He hadn't changed it since I'd last seen him. Though, he had grown a bit of a beard in the time we'd been apart. "Your friends and you are going down there, then?"

"How do you know?" My words were a little harsher than I intended. This was the man who had nearly killed me last time, and he was acting as if we were old friends. What did he want?

"I'm curious," he admitted. "I've been walking around people lately and no one else really seems to hear or see me. It gets lonely, so I thought maybe you'd spare a conversation if I dropped by." He shrugged. "I dunno. Doesn't seem like you're very happy to see me."

"You nearly killed me," I reminded in a low voice.

"You attacked me, remember?" He pointed up at his name. The words IMMORTAL OBJECT flashed briefly. "You can't go hitting people at random. You saw what happened to Petunia, didn't you?"

"Petunia?"

"The girl that struck you."

"Oh." I looked to the side. "Yeah, I guess I was a bit scared. I'm… I'm sorry."

"No need to be sorry." What was I doing? Regardless that he hadn't made a move to hurt me, this man was obviously cheating. I saw him open the creative mode screen back in the jungle. He had changed his own username and knew my real one through unknown means. Now he was saying that no one could see him. What was this guy?

"You're part of the Legion, aren't you?" I asked it before I had time to process it. He grabbed his ankles and pulled softly.

"Hm… I guess I could see why you'd think that. But no, I am not." He turned his head to the side, avoiding my eyes. "I don't see the point in what they're doing, anyway."

"Are you lying to me?" He looked to me without turning his head.

"I don't see the point in lying to you, considering you're the only one I can talk to." He scratched his cheek. His growing beard made a loud, velcro-like noise. "And to think I got you the Ender Bender, too. You needed it more than the two of them."

"_Got_ me this?" I pulled out the whip. "When did you-?" I paused. Sure enough, written in the sloppy cursive were the words 'To Marshy, From Steve' with the word Maria crossed out after the to. I tried rubbing it off, but it had been engraved in. "How did you…? Why…? What? The Endman dropped this, you couldn't have gotten it beforehand, it hadn't spawned yet."

"The Legion edited 'spawn' rates," he explained, stretching out his feet in front of him and touching his toes. "Nothing really spawns in this world. Instead, they have a huge bank of items that can be picked up, dropped, or found. When an item vanishes in this world, it goes right back into the bank to be teleported elsewhere. Bosses and NPC's and humans can be gotten rid of, but items, the numbers never change." He held his hand out. Two more whips appeared in his palm, hovering and spinning opposite directions. One was red, the other was blue. "There are only three Ender Benders, and the other two are too deep within the Bank for me to reach." He closed his fist and the whips vanished.

"How can you access the Bank?" I asked. He glanced at me. His purple eyes were trying to find the intention in my words, the reason I asked. I wanted to know how he could've gotten me this weapon. I wanted to know how he knew all this. I wanted to know, more than anything else, who this guy was. As if my thoughts had been heard, he lowered his chin slightly and smiled.

"A simple hacker," he said softly. "I know my way around a game like this." A lie. An obvious lie. I could tell by the way he said it and acted according to it. 'A game like this?' What other virtual reality games is he talking about? Maybe he was part of the Legion. Did he give me this whip to gain my trust?

"Thank you," I said anyway. "It's a great item." And it was. The Ender Bender looked ready to deal any amount of damage I wanted. It was lightweight and fit in my hand comfortably. Not to mention it was my favorite color.

"You're welcome." Steven smiled briefly, I nearly missed it. "Luck with you." One moment he was there, the next he wasn't. There wasn't a poof or a fading, he just blinked out of existence. That's when I heard the others' footsteps approaching. I stood up. They were just within earshot. It crossed my mind to bring up the mystery man, but for some reason, I didn't want to. Not yet.

Ability Analysis: Portal Placing.

User: Annabelle/Anime Eyes.

Ability Level: 1.

Current Uses: Teleportation, Tunneling.

Rank Out Of Living Players (The Lower, The Better): 1,348,157 Of 35,238,451.


	15. Boss Part 1

Chapter 15

"Ready, Marshy?" Annabelle asked. I shouldered the backpack she had given me and nodded. After evenly distributing our items, it was finally time to begin our descent. We took to the ladder and worked our way down, me first and York last. Our hands were busy, so each of us kept a torch clenched between our teeth. At first I was blinded by the light. But when York sealed up the entrance with as many inconspicuous blocks of dirt, the darkness was so thick that the torches seemed dim in comparison. The deeper we went, the more our eyes adjusted to the dimness. The walls of the vertical tunnel were made of damn stone brick. This made me think that perhaps we were walking right into a dungeon. We hit the bottom and to my surprise it was just another cave, this one a bit tighter than the others we had been through before.

We stepped onto the floor. We couldn't stand in a straight line like we were used to in most our games. The walls were too close together. We had to pick a partner and stand by them. York and I in the lead, we raised our torches to the darkness and swept them back and forth in an attempt to illuminate anything ahead. The unnatural darkness yielded no sign of breaking unless we penetrated it ourselves. Even six torches barely illuminated a few feet in each direction. From the back, Ruben and Scarlet looked upwards towards the exit.

"No one is coming yet," Ruben reported. "With York's handiwork on the surface, I doubt anyone will be able to find the path till at least this evening."

"An estimate," I assured him. "But we can't stand here and wait." I started onwards, glancing at York to make sure he was following. Our eyes met and he smiled faintly before doing a long step to catch up. He was tall, much unlike I had imagined. The more I spent time with this group, the more their present images and the images I had thought of them before began to merge. They weren't alien to me as they had started out. They were turning into familiars. More familiar familiars. Almost like they were just next-door neighbors that I didn't talk to properly until we got into the same college class.

The tunnel wasn't straight. It curved to the left, to the right, down, up, and in any combination of the four. There was no telling where we were going. Our compasses were constantly spinning in circles. Out altitudes changed from a thirty blocks below the surface to a hundred. There was something that set me off about it more than anything else. There were no noticeable minerals. Sure, there was stone. But everything else had been mined out. And you can try and tell me otherwise, but there had been people down here. Holes had been mined in the walls in manmade random patterns. Someone had been down this tunnel before, but I didn't want to believe it. Who could've already gone this far? The Endman hadn't been defeated yet, how had anyone known this was down here? There was no sign of other tunnels intersecting this one, either. It was one trail the whole way through, and there was not a single block of cobblestone that showed a patched up hallway, nor was I patient enough to search for one.

What about Steve?

My mind seemed to bring up his name on its own. The master hacker, or at least I assumed he was, might've been down here. No, he had to have been down here. He was sitting right at the entrance before we came down. He must've gotten all of these minerals from down here.

But… he had access to that Bank thingy, right? Why would he need all these minerals if he could get items like the Ender Bender? Wouldn't this have been just a giant waste of time?

The group came to a stop. There was a stone brick wall directly in front of us with a single torch on it. The tunnel did not branch off in any other direction, but the light of that single torch illuminated the circular room we had unknowingly stepped into entirely. It didn't appear to be anything really special besides the ability to cut through the darkness. It was made of coal and an old twig that looked to be weathered from age like the ladder had been. When York went to touch it, the flame died out, as well as all of ours. He pulled his hand back quickly and the torch resumed, unperturbed. Scarlet, who had been directly behind York and I, shuffled between us and put her hand on the wall, feeling it up and down. The stone brick didn't appear weak or hollow in any places.

"Mine through it?" she asked in my direction. I paused to think. If Steve had been here, why had he stopped here? Or, maybe he hadn't maybe, unlike what he had done in the tunnel, he placed the blocks back. I pulled out my amethyst pickaxe.

And watched as it shattered in my hands.

One moment I had a hard to craft, very expensive amethyst pick with barely any durability damage on it. The next it was in broken shards at my feet. If that wasn't startling enough, it made the sound glass being slammed against the cement, jolting all six of us. We had been in solid silence for about two hours, so Annabelle and Ham screeched in surprise. York and Ruben reached for their weapons out of instinct but only York prevented himself from pulling it out. Ruben's pearl sword shattered upon touching the air, making yet another, much louder, shattering.

"Stop! Stop!" I grabbed Annabelle by the shoulder and Ruben by the arm. The two of them froze, Annabelle with a hand over her mouth and Ruben's at his hip. Ham cut his screech off quickly, hands up at the ready to chop. Scarlet had paled and frozen where she stood, fists clenched at her sides. York held his hands in the air in surrender, eyes closed, lips sucked inwards. When the group had calmed and the shards had come to a standstill, there was a brief moment of silence. I released Annabelle and Ruben slowly. "The room has some sort of enchantment on it that prevents weapons and tools from being used. We can't mine through the wall, even if we wanted to. We can't punch things in this game as hard as stone without hurting ourselves."

"Then we turn back?" Annabelle asked. Her voice was a whisper. She was still trembling and I didn't blame her, those two shatters had been absurdly loud in the silence.

"We came this far," Ruben grumbled. "I don't want to-"

"OH YEAH!" Ham darted forward with a shout, startling us all once more. I thought he was just making fun of us for jumping at nothing, but apparently he wasn't. He had run right at the wall under the torch and rammed it with his shoulder. Not only did all the light in the room blink out and the tunnel give a terrifying shudder, but the sound of the wall crumbling filled the cavern. Annabelle latched onto me and gave out a closed mouth squeal. Ruben shouted something unintelligible and possibly vulgar at Ham before the wall had fully fallen. When the rocks came to a stop, the lights came back on. Not our torches, but the old one. In the new, menacing blue light it burned, we could see Ham lying in his mess of a doorway. One leg was bent over the other, his arms were out to the side as he lie belly down in the painfully jagged rocks. Ruben grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and lifted the half-limp twenty-year old to his feet. He stumbled, blinked a bit, then met Ruben's eyes. His left cheek was torn and dust had layered him, but he smiled and gave a thumbs up. "I've always wanted to be the Kool-Aid Man."

"You're a blasted idiot," Ruben scolded, pushing on his shoulder. Ham stumbled back, a bit groggy. His smile didn't fade.

"Worth."

I stepped past them and into the new doorway. My torch didn't illuminate until I had stepped past the rubble and onto the solid floor. Then it came to life with the same blue flame its brother had ignited in. This light wasn't brilliant to the eye, but it sure as hell was to the cave. Past that wall was an enormous cavern. The bedrock floor stretched further than my rendering distance could process, which had to have been longer than three football fields in every direction except the one I had came. The ceiling, too far for even the light to reach, was shrouded in darkness. I lifted the torch but it yielded no results, it might've gone as far as a block below the surface as far as I knew. And all of it, this entire dome, was nothing but empty. No mobs had spawned in the darkness before we had burst through. It had been untouched by everyone, including Steve.

"What happened here?" York asked me, stepping up to my side. His voice didn't even echo, it was just lost in the enormity of the room. The others fell in step beside us, eyes looking every which way. Only my torch seemed to work in this area, theirs refused to light. "Did someone spend their entire time in this game making a strip mine of this size?"

"Strip mine indeed," Ruben chuckled. "They must've made the tunnel, too. No minerals and ores back there, none in here. We've been following a dead trail this entire time."

"But the Endman… he was guarding here." Annabelle stepped forward, cupped her mouth, and shouted into the darkness. "Hello? Is anyone there?!" Like York's call before her, her voice was lost in the darkness. We stood in silence for a minute in anticipation. This room was quieter than the tunnel. Stiller. Creepier. I found myself looking over to my shoulder and all around constantly. There was something about it that unsettled me. "Are we… still going forward?"

"No," I found myself saying suddenly. The group looked to me. I kept staring forward. "There's something wrong with this place. They disabled weapons back there, and not in the usual way. No warning, no pop up, they just decided shattering them was the right way to go. The Legion has been here. And we all know that they can't be trusted." The group paused. I wasn't sure if they were thinking of ways to convince me to continue or were just plain bummed by my decision. They might've been relieved. They might've been resenting me. But my decision was final. I wasn't risking my five best friends in something that made my skin crawl.

"You're right, you can't trust us." The voice came from above us. Unlike ours, his voice echoed. Once, twice, thrice, until it became too many to keep track of. All of us turned upwards. Like a real football stadium, blinding lights started shining down on the floor, illuminating everything. My rendering distance expanded. And suddenly, everything was clear. We weren't in a cavern. We were in an arena. Lining the rims of the dome were tens of thousands of empty seats. Stone seats that had accumulated a bunch of dust. Seats that had never been sat in. Except for one, that was directly above the doorway we had created, facing us. In it was a very bored-looking Herobrine. The same Herobrine that we had seen on day one, the leader of the Legion. One leg was crossed over the other, one fist propped up his cheek, and an upset pout was on his kisser. His eyes, still the ghastly glowing white, were focused on us. "Funny. I expected more of you. And not so soon. And not so… scared."

"Were… were you waiting here for us?" Annabelle asked. He rolled his eyes, dusted himself off, then stood up.

"No. I wasn't waiting here for much longer than a few minuted. And no, I wasn't waiting for you six in particular. But I have had this place under my watch for a while now. Sensors and whatnot set up. I wanted to be here to greet anyone who arrived. I expected bulky heroes with tons of priceless weapons and lots of extra health and… well… I didn't expect a group of misfits to make it down here first." He bent his knees and jumped off. His leap took him up over the railing and down to the floor between us and the exit. All of us took an instinctive step back. "I suppose you'll do."

"What is this place?" York asked. Herobrine flattened out his eyebrow with one of his square hands.

"Well, it was supposed to be a grand city of mazes and puzzles and traps and fun things like that. I was going to have all of my friends gather here when it was done and watch as the lot of daring players who had been able to came this far try and find their way through it. I was hoping the vast majority of them would die in hopes there'd be a prize at the end to greet them. But after they had been jabbed, hit, thrown, and burned, they would meet the Over Dragon and finally meet their doom. But no," he turned his head to the side, "I have been too careless. You all arrived before I could think to even blueprint the city. It's a bit concerning, I won't lie to you." He sighed and closed his eyes. "Calm now, calm now…. The first plan never goes through the way it's wanted." He swung his arms out to the side and glared at us. "But that is alright. You're the first ones here, after all. Just like the first plan, the first of you won't survive."

Just as he finished speaking, something large and heavy dropped behind us, hitting the ground and splintering the bedrock between ivory talons. The six of us turned around and froze.

The Over Dragon had been summoned.

Welcome To MCO!

Month Five, Day Fourteen.

Deaths: 5,947,284.

Over Dragon Has Been Summoned.

All Players Are Welcome To Watch Via Your Menu!

Marshmallow Unicorn, Anime Eyes, Righteous God, Sacred Goddess, Hard Ass MoFo, And Yoshi Tamer Have Entered The Battle!

Health Has Been Fully Replenished!

Weapons And PVP Has Been Enabled!

Current Over Dragon Health: 250 Hearts.

Thank You For Your Participation In The Legion's First Set Of Exciting DLC Extras!

Good Luck!


End file.
